Beloved
by Balshumet
Summary: Vlad set out to make the perfect clone. He would be just like Daniel in every way, so it would be like he had the boy in his grasps. It was too bad he was nothing like he was supposed to be. But that was alright, he was perfect anyway.
1. He was an Experiment

**Balshumet: Well! This is a bit late, I'm so sorry about that everyone. My beta sister banned me from writing this weekend, to avoid burnout, and I didn't get myself back on the horse till after Monday. So this is really late. It won't happen again. This is my second story, and it's medium length as compared to what I have planned for the 'If Series'. By the way, this exists outside that fun realm, and it's completely Canon. This story should be finished by the end of Summer, that's the plan, right when I'm starting the newest planned story, April Fool's. As for the updating schedule, this one will be done every two weeks on Sundays. So every other weekend after a Bittersweet update, you'll get one for this story. Unless I get greatly inspired, expect that to be the norm.**

**This story _is_ a tragedy so expect tears of pain and sadness to flow from the characters and you. If you aren't crying by the end of this story, I haven't done my authoress job. So now for the warnings:**

**This story is a lower rating than my other DP story, that might change if needed, but it should have much milder language. Very little physical violence and action, it's a character driven plot story after all, no romance or anything like that. I do warn there will be adorable small children scenes in here, so if you are sensitive to sweetness remember to wash it down with some angst somewhere else. I think that's it in terms of warnings, there's something else, but you know it might spoil it. So I'll wait till the end of this chapter.(as the specific "problem" doesn't show up this chapter) Disclaimer time:**

**I, Balshumet, do not own Danny Phantom. I only own my little clone-let, and the plot herein. The show belongs to Butch Hartman, the wonderful man, and Nickelodeon and Viacom. I make no money from this labor of love, so save your litigious fees for someone who matters.**

**Now, onwards and upwards, to my newest story! Cya at the Bottom.**

* * *

><p><strong><span>He was an Experiment<span>**

* * *

><p>The room was bright. That's what he remembered first. Overly bright, lit by the unforgiving iridescents hovering above his, <em>my<em>…What was the word for it again? He had lapses like that. It was only fair, he had to learn everything from scratch, and so fast too. But he had to learn it, because, his, _my_, what was it…_Daddy_…Yes. _He_ wanted him to, and he loved him. Daddy had said so. And he was sure he loved him back, because it was the only truth he had ever known. He didn't know much, that's why he was always learning, but he knew;as if it was the only thing he had known since his first breath that _this_was true. Daddy loved him, and he loved Daddy back.

Vlad watched with detached interest as the wriggling infant before him crawled towards the side of his cold metal playpen. It made his way, slow and stumbling to the where he was standing, before lifting its hands up. It obviously wanted attention, affection. Vlad resisted the urge to sneer; he didn't have time for that at the moment. _Besides, the little buggers have a habit of melting when they are this small._ He reasoned. No point in getting attached when he wasn't sure it would make it over the next couple of days. He had learned that lesson the hard way after the first few attempts. Vlad walked away from the playpen, and over to the computer console a little ways off. Far enough so that he wouldn't compromise the readings, but close enough to intervene if something went wrong. The clones also had a habit of hurting themselves. _And not always accidentally either. _Vlad mused before starting up the machine.

He heard something loud in the bright room. Jarring and echoing all over his little world. And where had Daddy gone? He had looked away only for a moment, when he had lost his balance, and when he looked back, Daddy was already gone. Now there was this noise, and he was…he didn't know the word, but it didn't matter. He was, whatever this bad feeling was, and he wanted Daddy to make it better. He started to cry; Daddy always came when he cried, even if he didn't pick him up like he wanted, just seeing Daddy would make it better.

Vlad frowned as he heard the infant crying from his position at the computer. Undoubtedly, the sound of the machine starting had startled it, but _still_ he hated the sound. Infant cries were grating and loud, as if they were programmed just to annoy him. He shrugged when something he read about humans being genetically programmed to find baby cries obnoxious floated to the front of his mind. _It doesn't matter; this'll be over soon enough._ He tapped through the next few screens on his display a little more rapidly than before.

By all accounts, this clone was doing far better than he ever expected. There was no signs of DNA degradation, it was growing and thriving, it was superbly attached to his person, and to top it all off, it had none of self-destructive qualities that had caused him much trouble with the other ones. He winced as the cries took on a desperate quality, and he heard the clone make some incoherent babbling sounds of distress. Unfortunately, despite all of that good, it was still an annoying little brat at the moment. _No matter. With the accelerated growth pattern I inserted into its genome, that problem should solve itself in a matter of days._ Vlad heard it cry even louder if possible, and was just about to go over and calm it down, when a familiar _swish_came from the front part of the lab.

"God damn it Plasmius, what is that infernal racket?" Skulker hovered over to where Vlad was standing, hands placed firmly on either side of his head. He landed next to Vlad and peered over at the console.

"The clone. It's crying." Vlad answered absentmindedly. He needed to activate the currently dormant section of the clone's DNA. If he didn't it would only grow at normal rate, and he, under no circumstances, was going to deal with an infant for longer than necessary.

"Well shut it up then!" Skulker growled and crossed his arms in front of his chest. "Why is it making that noise anyway? Is it hungry or something?"

"Your concern is touching Skulker." Vlad said dryly. "No it's not hungry, or cold or something physical like that. I believe the sound of the machine frightened it." Vlad tapped a few more things on the keyboard to bring out the tools needed to activate its genes.

"Well, why don't you go over there and…I don't know, calm the little pup down?" Skulker glanced over to the metal pen where the clone was being held. Several pointy tools had come down from the ceiling right above it.

Right when the tools came into the line of sight of the clone, it stopped crying.

Skulker heaved a sigh of relief. _At least the thing has stopped making-_

He heard something coming towards the top of his world. It wasn't like the loud sound from before, but even though it was quieter it had the same growl feeling. He looked up, leaning back so far that he fell. He could see them now, little claws with… the feeling of jagged that he remembered. That feeling was bad, and he didn't like it. They kept coming closer, and closer and he couldn't stop them. He didn't want the jagged feeling, the one that went everywhere. He gasped as it dropped over the top of his world, and let out the biggest scream he could muster.

"Plasmius!" Skulker glared over at where Vlad was standing. "What in the world are you doing to that creature? It sounds like you are killing it." The infant was screaming at this point instead of crying, and it was driving him nuts.

"I'm doing no such thing." Vlad grimaced when the clone let out another large scream. "I haven't even touched it yet. I'm not sure what the problem is, but the faster I finish this, the sooner it'll stop crying." Vlad tapped out a few more keystrokes, and the machines halted their descent.

They whirled in a circle into position over the clone, before powering up. They took up space on the four corners of the metal pen, before charging the tips to a bright blue-green.

"By the way Skulker," Vlad reached over and held out a pair of goggles, "you might want to put these on."

Skulker snatched the goggles out of Vlad's hand, in a fit of pique. _At least the sounds of the machines are drowning out the whelp's whining._ He got them settled on his face, just as the first machine fired.

It let out a high whine, as the formerly glowing tip turned into a laser. The light landed on one of the clone's limbs. The other three lasers whirled to life, landing on the arms and remaining leg of the clone. The whine picked up in pitch and volume for a few seconds, before a final large flash emanated from the fours lasers. They suddenly shut down, and began retracting into the ceiling. Underneath all of the whirling from the machines retracting, the clone was still crying.

Vlad removed his goggles, and brought up a screen for a new internal scan. The computer let out a small ping as the new data filed into the hard drive. Vlad began moving through the data. _Good, looks like they are active._

"What did all that just accomplish, other than make the little thing cry more?" Skulker removed the borrowed goggles from his head and tossed them back at Vlad.

Vlad caught them, and enlarged the screen he was currently looking at. "Nanites." Vlad stepped further to the right, to give Skulker a better view. "I inserted them into the clone soon after it was finished forming. They are supposed to help keep its DNA stable, among other things. One of their secondary functions is to activate inserted sections of DNA inside its genome. For example, I added this," Vlad paused and pointed to a now highlighted section of DNA, "to the clone's DNA. It's a code for an accelerated growth phase. It basically removes the usual breaks from the growth process, telling the clone's body to grow unimpeded until it reaches the physical age of six. After that, it will grow faster than average, but much slower than before, until it reaches around 14 years of age. Of course all of these ages are marked by bone growth, as compared to the markers inside Daniel's own body. It should be full grown, of sorts, in about a month, if it doesn't try to melt first." Vlad finished up his explanation with a tap of his foot.

That was the thing about clones, if he could get them to form at all; they tried to melt during the first growth phase. Still, he had taken pains to avoid that problem with this one. The changes he'd made to the formation process, plus the high level nutrient supplements he'd been giving it, should avoid any energy shortfalls that resulted in melting. Finally, the Nanites would stop any small changes that would lead to degradation, and alert him to any big ones he'd have to head off himself. All and all, this should be a much more successful endeavor than the last…_27 tries._He was a determined man, but after all of these failures, Vlad was beginning to think this was an impossibility.

Skulker narrowed his eyes at the highlighted section of proteins on the screen. "So how does this not cause it to age out of control? I mean, it causes accelerated growth right, so what doesn't it just keep going until it reaches the end of the clone's life span?" Skulker walked closer to the screen. He wasn't much for biology, unlike his employer. He was much more adapt at technology and programming of all types, still, he knew enough to know this should be tricky. Honestly, he didn't know why his employer was attempting to clone the ghost child. It would be so much simpler to either manipulate the boy into an alliance, as he usually did, or destroy Phantom if he refused to comply. Then again, humans confused him, because Phantom didn't seem interested in allying with the only other half ghost on the planet. It had to be human nature doing it, because ghosts were never this illogical. Skulker was so lost in his own musings; he almost missed Vlad's reply. "What?" He had just caught the tail end of the reply, so it warranted being repeated.

"I said, the specific genes are programmed to turn off, after three days, _or _if the ends of the telomeres inside the DNA reach a certain length before that. In any case, I didn't know you had such an interest in biology Skulker."

Skulker grunted and walked away from the console screen. "I do not. I just remember how frustrated you were when the last clone died."

"Melted, more like ceased to exist. These things aren't really people anyway; they are barely even alive in most cases. However, it seems this one should be the exception to that rule so far." Vlad corrected.

"Whatever Plasmius, I'm not here to comment on your little science experiments anyway."

"Ah that's right, did you find the information I asked for?" Vlad began shutting down the computer, it was a separate system from his main one, having an external power supply backed up on several generators. It had all of his data on the current clone experiments after all, and he needed it well protected _and _hidden.

Skulker grimaced as the clone let out another cry, this time significantly more feeble than before. "I'd be happy to share, as long as you make that little creature shut up."

Vlad glanced over behind him towards the metal playpen. "It's _still_ crying?" Vlad frowned and stalked over to the pen, completely put out at having to stop his plans over a little noise. He had figured it would have worked out all of its energy and stopped by now. He leaned over the edge of the playpen, and looked inside.

He didn't understand what had happened. One minute he had been lying on his back, as the jagged feeling things came towards him, and the next there was this awful sound and light. It was so bright, it made the normal lights seem like it was the dark and from the warm place he had been before this. He had cried and cried, but his Daddy hadn't come for him. Then the lights had stopped, and he had felt…something new. Not like the jagged feeling, it wasn't a bad one, it was just _new_ and he was tired of learning new things today. He was just tired period. He tried to scream again, but all that came out was a small whining sound. His…noise maker must be tired too. All of a sudden, two strong arms lifted him up, and something was rubbing his back. He gripped the front of what was holding him, and whined some more.

Vlad patted the clone's back with a look of disdain. All that crying had the little infant covered with tears and mucus, and its determined grip was smearing it all over him. He silently thanked the fact this particular part of its life would be over soon, and rubbed what he hoped were soothing circles on its back. After a few more minutes, its cries turned into small hiccups combined with whining, and Vlad was able to relax its surprising steely hold on his lab coat. He shifted it in his arms and turned back towards to Skulker. "I'll be out in a second, let me set it back down. You can wait for me in the front part of the lab." Vlad said with a small wave.

Skulker rolled his eyes and walked back towards the ghost portal. It was in the front of the lab, and its green light made an easy beacon to navigate the sometimes dizzyingly large subterranean complex that was Vlad's lab.

After Skulker left, Vlad refocused his efforts on getting the clone to release his coat, and settle down again. He frowned when further patting didn't seem to be doing the trick. _Apparently, it was more upset than I thought._ Vlad shifted the clone a little more in his arms, so he could get a better look at it. There were no obvious marks, so that ruled out burns from the laser. And other than its red puffy face from all the crying, it seemed to be in good shape. So he couldn't understand what all the fuss was about.

He could finally feel the warm from the arms holding him, and it was calming him down. He opened his eyes, and looked around. He wasn't in his world; he was above it. He looked further up, and saw Daddy staring back. He felt the rest of his bad feelings run away at the sight of his Daddy, like they always did. He was safe now, of course he was, Daddy had come for him. He always did.

Vlad sighed when the clone finally stopped crying or whining or whimpering or any other irritating sound like that. He looked down towards the playpen and walked around to the backside. There was a small switch, a few inches from the floor. He tapped it with the toe of his boot, and the metal box before him shuddered.

Its corners slid down, lifting it off of the ground. Two of its walls became slotted, and half of the slotted walls slid down to join the corners now three feet off the ground, to add stability. With the base elevated, and the walls on two sides slotted, it looked like a particularly ugly crib instead of a playpen.

Vlad leaned over the side of the playpen turned crib, and adjusted the pillows and blanket into the semi-resemblance of a bed. He moved the infant in his arms as he worked, humming a happy tune at the current success of this cloning project. Having finished with the makeshift bedding, Vlad leaned over further to set the clone inside for a, hopefully, long nap. He couldn't beat down his surprise when the clone stubbornly clung to his lab coat anyway. Now more than a little annoyed, he moved one of his arms to pry its fingers off when he noticed its stare.

He wasn't upset any more, and he could see the soft blues of his world so close now. But Daddy was holding him, and it was what he had wanted to begin with. He didn't want to let go now ! He reached up and grabbed onto the white of the coat harder. His Daddy looked down at him, and the warm he remembered had to be love came back.

Vlad stopped, hand half way between the crib and prying the clone's hand off, a completely aborted motion after he got a good look at the infant. Once he wasn't crying or some such other annoying thing, it was amazingly cute. It reminded him of the few baby pictures the Fentons had sent of Daniel over the years. He heard it coo at him and reach for his face. Unfortunately, as far he could tell, it had no intention of releasing him any time soon, and the look it was giving him…He didn't know much about what love looked like anymore, but he'd bet his fortune that's the look it was giving him now.

He moved it higher in his arms, and it cooed louder, apparently satisfied with the new position. Vlad looked down at the cold metal crib and then back at the clone. Something like apprehension settled into his stomach at the thought of setting the clone down, he had just gotten it to stop crying after all. Vlad looked around and saw one of the few comfortable chairs in the lab. He had moved a few down here over the last couple of weeks as his cloning attempts took up more and more time. Now, it was looking entirely too inviting and his arms were getting tired. With only a moment more spared for indecision,  
>Vlad made his way over to the comfy arm chair. He settled back into the seat, and took a deep breath. The clone hadn't melted yet, a lot of them did within the first few minutes after the Nanites were turned on, and so it was a good sign. He looked down when an especially loud happy cry from the clone got his attention.<p>

He hadn't expected Daddy to still be holding him. He never did this long, but he was too happy to care. He let out a happy squeal and kicked his legs.

Vlad chuckled at the clone's obviously excited antics. "Alright you, calm down. A few minutes ago, you were exhausted, now you want to play hm?" He placed the clone against his shoulder and patted its back. That always sent the thing to sleep before, and he was sure it would work now. Vlad felt a small smile of triumph creep onto his face as, after a few minutes, the excited cooing and kicks slowed down. He heard the clone let out a large yawn, and begin to settle against him sleepily. Vlad settled it back into his arms and rocked it. _That should send it to sleep._ Vlad mused. He watched as its eyes closed, despite some determined effort from the small infant. _Just as stubborn as Daniel. Good._ Vlad began to get up, when the clone shifted in his arms, snuggling further in his grasp and leaning against his chest.

He couldn't get up without waking it now, and despite the fact he was sure he could get it back to sleep easily at this point, for some reason he just didn't want to wake it up. It might just be a particularly well cloned ball of ectoplasm at the moment, _without a few more modifications_, Vlad thought, but it was still rather cute. _And well, I suppose it wouldn't hurt to just hold it for a few minutes._ Vlad settled back in the arm chair, and hefted the clone closer. He heard it let out a small sigh, and he couldn't help but smile at it. _A very cute ball of ectoplasm indeed._

Skulker practically stomped over to the entrance to the current rear part of the lab. He had no idea what was taking his employer so much time, but he had better things to do than wait for him to get around to talking to him. He was about to demand Plasmius get on with it, when he noticed his employer holding the whelp in his arms. It wasn't where he was sitting or what he was doing that made him pause. It was the look on his face. Plasmius rarely looked so relaxed or at peace. _Maybe just once,_ Skulker reasoned, _it can wait._ He disappeared over towards the ghost portal, determining after that sight to just come back later.

* * *

><p>"Daddy!"<p>

Vlad smiled down at the clone sitting a few feet from his private study's desk. It had, over the last 24 hours, grown from a helpless crying infant, of six months, into a toddler of about two. _Ah, the wonders of modern science._Vlad was under the impression all children should come with an accelerate button of sorts. He was about to turn back to his work, when another loud exclamation got his attention. "Yes I see you." Vlad rolled his eyes, as the clone toddled over to his pants leg and tugged.

He wanted attention. He didn't like when Daddy ignored him for whatever he did at that big table. He walked back over to his play area, and picked up his page. The first time he had called out, Daddy hadn't even noticed the page. Maybe if he brought it with him this time…

Vlad sighed when another insistent tug broke his concentration again. "D27, did I not tell you to sit over there?" He looked down his nose at the little clone currently excitedly waving something at him. The clone didn't look at all convinced to move, _the stubborn thing, _so Vlad was forced to pick it up to get some peace. He stood up to walk back over to the clone's play area, when the piece of paper it was holding was unceremoniously shoved into his face. He frowned "What is this?" He held it in his left hand, as he balanced the small toddler on his hip.

"I made it."

"Yes I know D27 that is not what I asked you." Vlad chided.

"Oh." He scrunched his face, trying to think of the right word for what he was bringing. It was obviously for Daddy, so he hadn't thought about what to call it.

While the clone was lost in his musing, Vlad walked over to the play area and set both him and the paper back down on the floor. "Now D27, Daddy is busy working. I need you to sit quietly over here while I work. I promise we can play later alright?" Vlad didn't wait for a response, already walking back to his seat to continue working. It didn't really matter what the clone wanted, he had better things to do at the moment than baby-sit. Really, the only reason he was even in the same room with him, was the current growth spurt it was having. It could lead to serious instability, and if he wasn't close, he couldn't prevent any melting mishaps. While the inserted growth phase had its drawbacks, like the increased possibility of instability, the many benefits included not having to deal with a small aggravating child for more than a few days. And in Vlad's opinion, it was more than worth having to start over or tweak once or twice.

He settled back into his spot on the floor, still trying to think of a name for what he wanted to bring Daddy. Daddy wouldn't accept it without a name, so he had to think of one. He puzzled and thought until his thinker was sore. He rubbed his head and looked around the room. Then something got his attention. "What that?" He asked while pointing to something hanging on the wall.

Vlad looked up towards the clone, and followed its little fingers till his gaze met with the painting on the wall. "That, is a painting D27. That specific painting is by Van Gogh. It's called _Bridge_." Vlad supplied while signing a few more documents. "Now let me work." He waved a dismissive hand through the air, and focused back on the documents in front of him. Not one to be ignored, the little clone was soon tugging on his pants leg again. _I'm beginning to wonder why it is I want children anyway._ Vlad noted sarcastically before looking down at the creature tugging on his leg.

He had just figured out what to call his…what was the word, gift. Yes that was it! He would call his gift painting. His Daddy already liked those things, so there was no way this wouldn't work. He held it out in front of him when his Daddy looked down. "Painting." He said happily.

Vlad raised an eyebrow at the piece of paper being held out towards him. Now that he was actually looking at it, he could see it was one of those silly childish drawing kids made, the ones overly enthused parents hung on refrigerators. _But- _"Why in the world are you calling it a painting?" Vlad voiced the tail end of his thoughts.

He pouted, wilted by the name not working at all. "For you." He tried to hold it a little higher. _Didn't Daddy like it?_ He thought more than a little upset.

Vlad picked up the picture and looked it over. He had no idea what it was supposed to be, that's why he had asked in the first place. When he glanced back down, the clone looked close to tears. _What in the world is its problem?_ He set the picture down onto his desk and pulled the little clone onto his lap. "What is the matter?" Vlad practically snapped. He really didn't have the patience for a tear fest or some other such antics. _Honestly, you would think I had told it, it was going to die with how sad it's looking._

By now big blubby tears were rolling down his face. He knew Daddy didn't like when he cried, but he didn't care. Daddy hadn't even liked his gift, and he had worked so hard on it. It had taken him…well he didn't know in grown-up time, but a _really _long time to make, and now Daddy didn't even care. He heard his Daddy ask him what was wrong, but by now, he was too upset to even tell him. "Yo-you…do-don…even…li…it!" He stuttered out.

Vlad glared down at the blubbering child on his lap. _This is utterly ridiculous. I have a merger to plan, well more like a takeover but still, and the only things this clone can do is whine and distract me. _Vlad was a little more irritable and impatient than usual. The clone had tried to destabilize last night sometime around 3am, and again around 6am. The clone obviously didn't remember those little near melting mishaps, but Vlad did, or more specifically, Vlad's body did. It was paying him back in spades right now; sleeplessness wasn't something he was used to. "D27." Vlad alternated between patting and rubbing its back. "Calm down, I never said I didn't like it. I was just wondering why you were calling it a painting. It isn't you know." Vlad stated matter of factly.

He sniffed and rubbed his face with the back of his hand. Daddy did like his gift. Of course he did, because Daddy loved him. He had just said something wrong again, he was good at that he found. He didn't know a lot of words, so sometimes he said the wrong thing, and it made it harder for Daddy to get. "What it then?"

"What _is _it you mean." Vlad corrected gently. "A painting is made on a canvas, with certain materials. What you just gave me is more like," Vlad paused in thought. The first word that came to mind was "doodle" or "drawing", but that didn't sound very encouraging, and he didn't need the thing crying on him again. Suddenly the right word came to him. "It's a sketch." He reached for the poorly illustrated scribble and handed it back to the clone. "Sketches are like paintings drawn on paper. They are usually rough drafts of a full painting though, so-" Vlad stopped when he realized he was talking to a two year old, about something he frankly couldn't be paid to give a damn about. He cleared his throat and set the small child, his little art work in hand, back on the ground. "Now how about this? You make me some more of these sketches while Daddy finishes working, and I'll look at all of them after I'm done." He propositioned. _That ought to get it out of my hair for an hour or so._ Vlad mentally congratulated himself and waited for the clone to process the offer.

He was already happier thinking Daddy liked his gift, and now Daddy wanted more of them! He wasn't sure what to make first. He was so happy he almost forgot to answer Daddy. "Yes!" He squealed and nearly ran back over to his play area. There was so much to make. First he would make Ghost Skulker…

Vlad heaved a sigh of relief when in the next five minutes the clone continued to scribble furiously at the paper on the floor near him. If he was lucky, he'd be finished with the last of his reading by the time the clone tuckered itself out for a nap. On his side was the growth spurt, which kept it tired and nearly always ready for sleep. He was surprised it was even up at the moment, it hadn't slept since 8am, and it was now nearly 3pm. It was really a new record for it, and unfortunately left him to be assaulted by its childish whims. _Still, at least it should stay busy for a little while yet._

Vlad hummed as he finished the last his reading nearly an hour later. The clone hadn't made a sound, let alone moved since he told it to draw. _I really should have thought of this earlier. This solved the distraction problem easily. I might have to buy it some art supplies._ Vlad mused. He walked over to the clone after setting his work inside the brief case by his desk. He leaned over the thoroughly distracted clone's play area and watched it work.

He was working really hard on this last one. It was supposed to be a picture of Daddy. He had drawn Ghost Skulker and a picture of place where he slept too. He frowned when he realized he needed a, what was the word? Blue. A blue sketch maker to finish his sketch. There wasn't any around though; he had looked really hard already when he was making the first sketch. He looked up when he felt someone sit next to him. He smiled. Daddy was sitting with him. Maybe he knew where to find the blue sketch maker. "Daddy?" He looked over at his Daddy.

Vlad was completely taken aback. While the first drawing had been terribly crude, he could actually make out what these were supposed to be. There was one of his lab, another of Skulker, and the final one was shaping up to be him. True, they were all scraggly and drawn with wandering lines, but it was close enough he could tell what they were. _That's surprising, an hour ago; he could barely make vague shapes. Interesting, I wonder if-_

"Plasmius."

Vlad was snapped out of his musings by a metallic voice by the door. He looked over his shoulder to find Skulker standing in the doorway to his personal study. "Skulker, how long have you been standing there?" He said while rising from his position on the floor.

"Long enough to be bored." Skulker answered.

"You disappeared yesterday, I was wondering when you'd get back here. Maybe if you said something instead of just standing there, you wouldn't have had the chance to be bored." He had crossed to the fore part of his study and was half way out of the door when a loud whine got his attention.

"Daaadddyy!" He said again. He was ignoring him again, and now for Ghost Skulker. He had been really good too. He hadn't made a sound while he drew his sketches, and Daddy had promised to look at them after he had finished working. And he was finished, he didn't put the paper away until he was; he had said so himself.

Skulker walked past Vlad into the room, and stared down at the clone. "Plasmius, who is this?"  
>"The clone Skulker." Vlad said while rolling his eyes. "I told you I was going to accelerate its growth, and so I did." Really, he had explained this already, and Skulker was no idiot, surely he had understood him the first time.<p>

"This whelp is the clone? I thought it was a baby? Wait, so it grew _this _much overnight?" Skulker was incredulous to say the least. The clone had been barely able to crawl yesterday afternoon, and now it looked nearly three years of age. He frowned as Vlad joined him by the entrance to the study.

"Indeed." Vlad answered all three questions at once. "It should only take it another two days to reach the age of six. Right now it's around, actually, I haven't bioscanned it in awhile, I might as well do so now." Vlad stepped around Skulker and back into the room. "Maddie dear." Vlad called out to the open space in front of him.

Within a few seconds, a blue spandex clad hologram had appeared in the room. "Yes lamb chops?" The Maddie hologram cooed.

"I need you to run a scan on the clone. Give me its current age, and simplified biological status, I'll peruse the specified data later tonight." Vlad addressed to the floating hologram.

"No problem sweetie." The hologram snapped her fingers and a digital display of the data requested replaced her in the air in front of Vlad.

Vlad quickly looked through the information before turning to talk to Skulker. "Looks like it's currently 26 months of age, it was nearly two around noon, so that's not so bad. Still, it looks like the retardant I inserted into its system this morning is still in effect. It should be 28 months by now if the initial calculations are correct. No matter, that should wear off in another hour or so, with very little delay to its growth." He flicked through another few screens, taking in normal humans vitals alongside not so normal vitals provided by the Nanites. He was about to review the, as far as he knew, dominant ghost vitals when a loud scream startled him.

Daddy wasn't listening at all. He had tried calling his name, but he was too busy looking at the lights in the air. He was doing that and talking to Ghost Skulker, and he was tired of waiting. He had promised! Why didn't he just come over and look at his sketches like he said he would? He was so upset right now, but he didn't want to cry. He had just cried, and it didn't get him what he wanted either. He was…he was…_mad._ That's what he was, and he wanted Daddy to listen to him now. "DADDY!" He screamed and stomped his feet. _Why do Daddy not come over here?_ He wondered.

Vlad stared over at the little clone currently stomping his feet in anger. Its face was bright red and its fists were balled up so tightly, he was sure it would leave crescent shaped marks later. He frowned, and crossed his arms. It was not about to throw a tantrum on him. "D27." He said in the sternest voice he could muster. When it did nothing to impede the coming emotional melt down, he trudged over to its play area. He few seconds later, he was tapping an impatient foot as the clone looked up at him. "D27, stop that. _Right now._" He looked down at the clone, a firm frown fixed on his face. The clone looked back, tears in its eyes from being practically yelled at, though Vlad couldn't say he cared at the moment. _I swear this creature is so emotionally unstable. Why can't it pick an emotion and stick to it for five seconds and stop being so needy?_

On some level, he recognized he was being unreasonable. Children had a habit of larger mood swings than adults, and they also craved both attention and affection, neither of which he had been giving out over the last couple of hours. But darn it all if its little mood problems weren't beginning to drive him nuts. _Just another reason why children need an accelerate button._ Vlad concluded with a snort.

"Buh, Daddy…"

"No buts." He said in a way that brokered no arguments. Instead of his intended effect, the declaration only did the exact opposite of what he wanted.

The clone started to bawl its eyes out.

He was screaming and crying at this point. Daddy was being so mean and not fair. Daddy said he would play with him later, even look at his sketches, but now he was being yelled at for asking him to. It was completely not fair.

"Oh look Plasmius, you made the little pup cry. You're model father material." Skulker snipped at a very frustrated looking Vlad.

"Oh shut up Skulker, I don't suppose you have any suggestions do you?"

"Yeah actually." Skulker said dryly. "Why don't you make it shut up, and give it a real name?"

"A fantastic idea, but if you didn't know, I was asking for suggestions on how to _make it shut up_." Vlad screamed down at the crying child in front of him. The yelling only caused more tears and unhappy wails however, and Vlad had to resist the urge to cover its mouth with ectoplasm to shunt some of the noise. Vlad turned around towards Skulker with his hands on his hips.

"I don't know Plasmius, it's your kid." Skulker shrugged and crossed his arms. In his opinion, yelling wasn't going to have the desired effect, but what did he know about human cubs?

Vlad huffed and rubbed at the headache forming behind his temples from all the screaming. Just when he was about to go through with that ectoplasm plan, he sensed something amazing. The room filled with very familiar, at least to him, spectral energy. He gasped when it set off his ghost sense, and he whipped around towards the clone.

Its eyes were glowing a familiar green, and the air around it was moving slightly with the increased energy it was pumping out.

"Well would you look at that? It seems all this excitement has finally turned its ghost core on, well at least all that noise wasn't for nothing." Vlad noted before leaning down to pick up the clone. "D27-"

"You are not actually calling it that. Plasmius, that's a horrible name."

"It's an experiment Skulker. Maybe after I'm sure it won't melt, I'll call it Daniel, but for now D27 will suffice." Vlad shifted the still upset child in his grasp, placing it flush against the right side of his body, so he could have his left arm back. He noticed the cries had descended back into the realm of whimpers and hiccups. _Finally._ "D27." He tried again to get its attention; he was rewarded with a tear filled stare in his direction.

He was tired. All this crying had worn him out, and Daddy was going to be angry because he had cried too. He didn't want Daddy to be angry, but if he had just listened before, he wouldn't have cried or screamed or anything. "I'm sorwe Daddy. I don mean to cry. You just prawmissed to play." He sniffed and wiped his face with the back of his hand.

"Don't do that." Vlad scolded and reached into his pocket for a handkerchief. He wiped the clone's face off, and watched as the little attention he gave it calmed it completely. Vlad sighed and decided to not set the clone back down. _He's more likely to cry when not being held._ "I'm not angry." _ Well not anymore._ He added mentally.

"No?" There was no way Daddy wasn't angry; he didn't like crying at all. He said it made his, what was the word? Brain, made his brain hurt. A headache in his brain Daddy had said.

"No I'm not. I just wanted to know what was wrong." _So I could make the screaming stop._ "If you talk instead of crying or screaming I can fix it. I can't make anything better if I don't know what's wrong." Vlad explained. He noticed the clone yawn and silently thanked whatever god had decided to make the little creature finally get sleepy. "Now come on, it's time for a nap." He walked past Skulker and motioned with his left hand for him to follow. Vlad pulled down on the left football player on his fireplace, and waited for it to open into the stairway leading into the lab.

"Good, because I'm not delaying a second time because the whelp has most of your attention." Skulker grumpily informed Vlad. He followed after his employer when the stairs appeared.

"If it wasn't so damn needy, and what do you mean a second time? You ran off yesterday if I recall correctly."

"You must have spent a good half an hour in the back part of the lab before I came back to see what keeping you. I don't know if you got sucked into some kind of time warp or something, because you didn't even notice that much time had passed. Even worse, you must have gone temporarily deaf as well, because I stomped my way back there, and you didn't even complain. When I got back into the rear part of the lab," Skulker began to explain, "you were still holding the clone, so I decided to come back today."

Skulker and Vlad passed into the back part of the lab.

"Don't tell me you were so distracted you didn't notice me leaving? Is the clone that entrancing?" Skulker teased lightly.

Vlad set the lightly dozing clone into his bed, and turned back towards Skulker. "Hardly. Perhaps if you came and talked to people, instead of lurking in doorways, you might not have had that problem. Now about that information I sent you to get…" Vlad walked back towards the front part of the lab, Skulker in tow.

* * *

><p>Vlad was back in the lab. It was the middle of the night, nearly 2am. He couldn't sleep. After Skulker had left, the clone had destabilized once again, much more seriously this time. That had been hours ago, but it still weighed heavily on his mind. So he had decided to go through the data from earlier today. Despite the destabilizing episodes, the clone's DNA was looking great. The last episode was likely prompted by its newly awakened ghost powers rather than anything on its human side. <em> I'll have to examine that later tomorrow, er today.<em> Vlad thought blearily. He was about to get up for the night, when a frightened scream got his attention.

The clone shot up in bed and blindly groped around for a few seconds before getting its bearings.

He had seen such bad things. There was a monster chasing him in the dark. It was super scary, and worse of all, Daddy hadn't come to save him. That had never happened before, and he really wanted his Daddy to be here right now. Just in case the monster from his bad dream came back to get him again. "Daddy?" He called out into the dark around him.

Vlad sighed when he heard the clone call to him. It might not have known he was here, but he couldn't just leave it alone in the dark before checking to see if it was alright. He walked over to the bed and crouched down next to it. "Yes?"

He looked over to the side of the bed not next to the wall. Daddy was right next to him! He didn't know how Daddy did it, but like magic he was always there. "I had bad dream." He reached out for Daddy, wanting to be held.

Vlad scooped up the clone and walked back over to the arm chair he had rocked it in just yesterday as an infant. "What was it about?" He sat down in the soft plush piece of furniture as the clone began a disturbingly vivid tale about being eaten alive. "That sounds…" _horrifying, _"very scary D27, but you don't have to worry, it was just a dream. Nothing is going to eat you." He rubbed reassuring circles on its back as it leaned into his chest.

He felt a lot better now that Daddy was holding him. The monsters could still eat him though, even though Daddy said they couldn't. "You mean it?" He asked. He could feel his eyes go wide and get watery at the thought of the bad monsters eating him again.

"Yes I promise D27, no one is going to hurt you with me around. Not ghosts, not monsters, no one." Vlad watched as the clone settled bonelessly into his body, all the tension from the nightmare leaving it.  
>"Now go back to sleep, I'll be right here." He got up from the chair and began to walk back towards the bed.<p>

"NO! If you leave the monsters will eat me." He was sure of it. His Daddy was the only thing keeping the monsters away.

Vlad sighed and sat back into the chair. He didn't bother arguing the point. The clone was too tired for logic, and too little for it to really work to begin with. So instead, he picked out a favorite lullaby from his childhood, and hummed it while patting its back. He was sure this would send it to sleep. And in a matter of minutes, he was rewarded with the soft breaths of a person in deep slumber. He walked back over to the clone's bed, and placed it inside. He wouldn't be too far for the next 36 hours or so. The possibility of the clone melting was too great, and its DNA was the best looking so far. Vlad decided to make a compromise of sorts, and moved the chair next to the clone's bed.

_No reason not to be comfortable if I have to be here._ Vlad reasoned. As he watched it sleep, he was stuck with how fragile and human it looked. Even though he told himself not to get attached, with such a human and cute form, it was becoming rather difficult. Worse, despite the crying and whining, it was an amazingly endearing creature. He found his hand running through the already nearly shoulder length dark hair on its head.

The clone sighed and leaned towards his touch.

Vlad closed his eyes for a comfortable rest of his own. He stilled his hand running through his-_its_ hair and settled back for sleep. Maybe if he said it was an experiment again, he would actually believe himself this time.

* * *

><p><strong>Balshumet: Alright, so how did you all enjoy the chapter? I know I liked it, if only because the little clone, who shall remained un-real named for a little longer, is so cute. I do admit trying to see the world from an infant's perspective was difficult at times, but I'm ok with how it came out. Now for that final warning, there will be character death, this really wouldn't be a tragedy without it. In fact, despite the fact the characterization of the clone is my own, you all have already met this character in canon. I'm sure the canon buffs will figure out who this is very soon, guessing at it (telling) people in the reviews or something like that won't spoil anything, so feel free if you'd like. <strong>

**I should be back next Sunday with the first update to this story, and this Saturday with the update to Bittersweet. I'll have a special treat to all those you added Bittersweet to Reviews, Alerts, and Favs this coming update, so look out for it. I'll see you all this Saturday, my lovelies, and as always R&R.**


	2. Making Progress

**Balshumet: Hey! I bet some of you thought this story was dead. What with it not sticking to the twice a month schedule for updating I made for it. But it's not! Part of it is life being crazy, and the other part is Bittersweet Futures being an attention whore. The last part is the main character for this tale, little D, just being calm and patient, waiting for me to get back to him, unlike Danny screaming at me to "explain this BS" that is the world I dropped him in. So there is that. Luckily for you all, there is a fun good news surprise at the end of this chapter, but first the Disclaimer:**

** I, Balshumet, do not own a lick of Danny Phantom. It belongs to Butch Hartman, Nickelodeon, Viacom, and a whole buncha people much more rich than I am. This is true, because if I own Danny Phantom, there would be a lot more sadness and heartbreak in what swears itself to be a kiddie show.**

**Now that I'm done with that, I give you, my readers, the story. Cya at the Bottom!  
><strong>

* * *

><p><strong><span>Making Progress<span>**

* * *

><p>Vlad sat silently looking through the clear Plexiglas window. He was getting a wealth of data at the moment, but nothing truly unexpected. In fact, there was barely anything remarkable about it, the data looking almost completely human. He had been sure his experiment would have been doing better by now. After it started producing energy, when its core turned on, he expected it to be able to transform. However, it seemed that it either couldn't sustain the constant level of energy necessary to maintain a spectral form, or its core was only on intermittently. In either case, it meant the creature was behind on Vlad's time table, and that was unacceptable. He pushed away from the data console and walked directly into its line of sight. Maybe he had been premature in his assessment of its potential?<p>

This was so hard, but he had to try. He had been at it for the last two hours, but nothing seemed to let him do what Daddy wanted. Daddy had asked him to…transform. To transform into a spectral something or other. D27 couldn't remember the exact phrase, but basically his Daddy wanted him to turn into a ghost. He panted as his second attempt in so many minutes failed. He felt something inside him ache as he pulled at the cold part inside of him his Daddy had said was his ghost half. Nothing worked, but he had to keep trying.

Vlad frowned over at the data on the screen. It seemed the clone's core wasn't developed enough to hold a spectral form. From what he was seeing, it was performing the right action, but its core wouldn't turn on all the way. At least not long enough to initiate a transformation. The older halfa scowled. There was nothing to compare this data too, so he didn't know whether or not this was normal development, slow development, or even if the brat just wasn't trying hard enough. Vlad started as the new ream of data flew into the computer. The clone's core was showing signs of extreme fatigue. _I'd better tell that thing to stop before it hurts itself._ Vlad concluded while heading to the lower part of the observation room he'd constructed.

The ache was growing stronger now, and the pain left him panting and shaking. Worse though, was the very bitter taste of failure. Daddy would be so upset with him for not transforming like he was told. D27 placed his hands on his knees and leaned over to catch his breath. Before he could stop himself from gasping, he heard the door to the room open. He looked over to find his Daddy walking towards him, a frown planted firmly on his face. _I hope I'm not in trouble._

"Alright D27, that's enough." Vlad strode over to the winded clone. It was barely on the upper side of three at the moment, though it certainly didn't act it. Admittedly, he'd handed it a dictionary a few hours ago to keep it out of his hair while he set up the training room systems, _and_ to give it practice reading while, hopefully, curing some of its verbal mishaps. But even assuming it was a fast study, that didn't account for some of the changes in behavior and ability. He was beginning to have particular thoughts about the clone strengthened. However, at the moment, he just needed the little creature to desist before it hurt itself.

"But Daddy, I didn't transform yet." He was confused. Daddy had been very clear when he left to go into the upstairs room. He had to turn into a ghost, but he hadn't done that yet. So why was he asking him to stop?

"Yes I'm well aware, but it seems your core isn't as developed as I supposed. You aren't going to be able to transform for a while yet, perhaps another day or two." Vlad paused and turned over the thought in his mind for a moment. Another day would make the clone around six years of age.

"Oh." D27 was very sad about that. He had wanted to turn into a ghost for more than one reason. Yes, he wanted to make Daddy happy, but being a ghost looked so very cool. He wanted to have powers and everything too.

Vlad watched with muted interest as the clone's face dropped into a frown. It was looking like it was going to cry _again._ He had to admit, while it cried plenty, it put up with a lot of non-attentiveness from him, and that was likely directly correlated to its crying. The only question was how to cheer it up before it started blubbering again. It was because he hated how much noise its crying made, not because he hated seeing it upset. He didn't care if it was upset; only if it was annoying. _Ah._ Vlad concluded after brief contemplation. _This ought to help._ "How about I demonstrate some ghost powers for you? Last time I only explained how to transform. In fact, even if you can't transform, you might be able to use some of these powers, as they are available even in human form." Vlad noted with triumph the way the clone's face lit back up.

Just as he was feeling upset enough to ask for something to draw with, Daddy said he would do the best thing ever. Having powers was exciting, and even if he couldn't transform yet, he was glad his Daddy was willing to teach him how to do something else. "Yes, I'd like that a lot." D27 smiled, sat back, and waited to see how more ghost powers worked.

Vlad look down at the clone's completely attentive face. It was wide eyed and bright, eager and ready to learn anything. _A vast improvement of Daniel's typical temperament when interacting with me._ "Now D27, the first power I'm going to show you is invisibility. Do you remember what invisible means?"

"Yes Daddy. That which cannot be seen. Out of sight; not apparent." D27 answered immediately. He had taken to reading the dictionary after Daddy taught him the basics of reading a few hours ago. Even after his Daddy had tried to get his attention on something Daddy said was "more suitable entertainment for a child your age." Whatever that meant, it ended up with him with a much smaller and more boring book in his hands. _But at least it had pretty pictures._ D27 concluded. In any case, it had certainly made it easier for him to talk to Daddy.

"Yes very good." Vlad responded to the dictionary perfect answer. "Among ghosts' many powers is the ability to become invisible to the naked eye. They do this by refracting visible light around their being. Creating a force field of energy that bends the light away from their person, and so removes the ability of the light to reflect off of their person and into the eye of the would be observer. Naturally, the force field of energy they use to do this is invisible to the human eye as well, resulting in complete invisibility." A day ago Vlad wouldn't have bothered with such an expansive and detailed explanation, but at the moment, he was testing a theory. Vlad raised an eyebrow waiting for the clone to paraphrase the concepts like he had instructed him to do earlier with others.

"Yes, the energy is invisible and bends the light, and therefore ghosts themselves are invisible." D27 had taken to repeating the concepts he learned back to his Daddy. That way if he didn't understand something, he'd get the confusion solved quickly, now instead of later. _Though, Daddy has been laughing less, so maybe it's not so good._

"Correct D27. So now that you understand the mechanics of the process, I'm going to show you how to physically perform the trick." Vlad stepped forward and placed his hands, palms facing it, in front of the clone. "Now I'm going to start with something simple, just my hands. I want you to just watch me do it first, and then I'll show you what it feels like. Finally, I want you to give it a try unaided, are we clear?" Vlad paused and looked the little clone in the eye, to make sure it was still paying attention.

"Yes Daddy, I understand." He blinked as his father dropped down to his eye level and turned his hands invisible. It was really cool. One second they were there, and the next, they were completely see-through.

Vlad held his hands invisible for a few seconds before making them visible again. "Alright. Now place your hands against mine, and I'll show you what it feels like." He waited for the clone to comply, pondering over another interesting aspect about the creature. It could learn to use its powers by simply observing or, at other times, being in contact with another being using those same powers. That was how he taught it to transform, all he had to do was hold it while he transformed, and _presto_ the little bugger knew how to do it too. It was like a sponge for some matters. The clone placed its starkly smaller hands against his own and tapped its feet in excitement. Vlad suppressed the urge to chuckle at its excited antics. He quickly turned his hands invisible and shifted the invisibility onto the clone's hands as well.

The cool tingle of ghost powers swept over his hands. Right after the feeling passed, his hands disappeared from sight. They were invisible all the way up to his wrists. D27 stared in wonder at the invisible section of his own arms before they suddenly reappeared when Daddy moved his hands back.

"Now, I want you to give invisibility a try. Try to remember what turning the power on and off felt like, and replicate that." Vlad paused before saying, "You do know what replicate means right?" Sometimes he forgot the clone was only two days old literally, and three and a half years in human terms from the accelerated growth.

"Yes Daddy. To fold; bend back. Or in this case, the act of repeating, duplicating, copying, or reproducing." D27 knit his eyebrows in concentration as he tried to repeat the feeling from the opposite direction. He had learned he had to push the feeling of his ghost powers from inside, near his chest, to where he wanted to go, and not the other way around like he felt Daddy do it. He had to…mirror, that was the word, and the actions he had felt and not exactly copy them. D27 fumbled around for the feeling he remembered, reaching for the cool pool in his chest and pushing it outward. He brought the tingling feeling to his finger tips, and then worked it back towards his wrist, just like Daddy had showed him.

Vlad watched the clone exercise an admirable level of spectral energy control. It had pulled a small amount of spectral energy to the end of its hands before trying to turn them invisible. He had expected the first attempt to be sloppy, haphazard, and most of all quick. The clone's first attempt was none of these things, and it solidified another piece of the puzzle surrounding the clone's abilities.

The cold feeling got stronger until he felt it suddenly stop all together. D27 had closed his eyes to concentrate, but now that the feeling of his ghost powers had abruptly ended, he curiously opened his eyes to peer down at his hands. He could see right through them! If he couldn't feel his own hands at the ends of his wrist, he'd be sure they were gone, or never there to begin with. In the few seconds it took to gap at his own invisible hands, D27 lost concentration, and the whole effect failed.

"Very good! You got it on the first try." Vlad quickly congratulated. "I knew you could do it. Why don't you practice holding it a little longer before we move onto something else?" He was secretly much more impressed than he let on. Even if the power of invisibility was basic, it had used it in a completely controlled manner, something that took _him_ a few months to do. _Perhaps being "born" with these powers makes using them more natural?_ Vlad considered while he watched the clone make a second attempt at controlling its invisibility powers.

D27 beamed at the encouragement and praise. He closed his eyes to focus once more and started the whole process over again, though this time it went a little faster. He felt the tingles work up from his fingers tips, but it didn't stop until it reached his elbows this time. When he opened his eyes, it looked like he had no lower arms; they were entirely invisible. D27 held it for a few seconds longer than the first time, before his chest started to hurt again, and his arms popped back into existence when the pain grew sharper. He rubbed the sore achy spot in his middle before looking back up at Daddy. "Why does it hurt?"

Vlad sighed before answering, "It's not supposed to, but your ghost core is probably tired from earlier when you were trying to transform. When you don't have the energy you use your ghost powers, it'll strain your core to make more, and that can be anywhere to uncomfortable to painful, depending on the level of stress you are putting on it." He frowned before continuing, "It doesn't hurt a lot does it?"

D27 shook his head. "Not anymore, but before it um…when I was trying to transform into… ghost." He answered distracted, wiggling his now visible fingers, before turning them invisible again. _This is fun though. No wonder Ghost Skulker is always sneaking up on me while invisible._

"We should probably stop for the day; I don't want you over-stressing your ghost core." _Or trying to melt on me either._ Vlad added mentally. The clone had tried to melt just hours before in the early morning around 3am, and it seemed the worst melting mishaps were always well before his brain wanted to function at full capacity.

"What? No! We just got started." He whined. "Please please please! Just a little bit more, oh pl-"

"D27, do _not_ whine. I hate that sound, and no, I don't want you hurting yourself." Vlad huffed and narrowed his eyes at the clone. _Once again,_ _so glad for that inserted acceleration button._

He didn't want to disobey his Daddy, but he _really_ wanted to learn more about ghost powers. _Maybe if I ask enough times, he'll say yes._ "But Daddy…" He started in the whiniest voice he could muster, "I really _really_ want to learn more ghost powers. Can't you super pretty please-"

"Stop it…"

"With a big heaping pile of sugar and-"

"D27 desist this instant."

"Hug and kisses and-"

"Enough!" Vlad screamed at the clone a few feet away. He only felt more frustrated when it stared up at him with big shining eyes, looking like it was about to burst into tears. _Deep calming breaths…deep calming breaths. Do not let this thing get under your skin._ He took one more shuttering breath before saying, "Listen D27, Daddy is sorry he yelled at you, but that _infernal_…" Vlad stopped when he saw the big sad looking tears rolling down the clone's cheeks. _Ok, new rule, yelling at the clone only makes it upset. It is not like most things, where yelling makes them more effective._ "Listen, I'll teach you _one_ more power today, and then that's it. Then you are going to stop for today alright?" Not that the thing really had a choice in the matter, but if he gave it the appearance of a choice, maybe it would behave.

D27 sniffed and wiped his eyes with the back of his hand. "Rully?" He asked in a shaky stress filled voice.

"Yes _really._ Now," Vlad bent over and began wiping the remaining tears from its face, "how about I teach you how to use intangibility?"

He perked up completely at the offer. The only thing that would be better would be transforming into a ghost like Daddy. "Oh yes! Please!" D27 smiled widely before remembering he was supposed to be paying attention. With sudden seriousness and extreme effort, he schooled his face into the picture of attentiveness.

This time Vlad couldn't suppress a laugh at the clone's behavior. He held out a hand when its face melded into a small frown. "Oh no D27, I'm not laughing at you. I promise. Now the technicalities for how intangibility is possible are rather…" _Involved? Difficult? Way over your little head? _"Hard to grasp. So I'll skip it for the moment."

He had to stop himself from begging to hear it anyway. Even if he didn't understand something right away, he remembered everything, so he might later. But he wanted to learn how to use his ghost powers, and if he interrupted Daddy, he might not get a chance today, so it would have to wait. D27 realized his Daddy was waiting for him to show he was listening, so he nodded.

"So I'll demonstrate this power just like I did invisibility, but in this case, I'm going to need something solid for you to practice on, so follow me." Vlad turned on his heel and walked towards one of the training room's tables nearby. He stood to one side of it and waited for the clone to settle in next to him. When he was sure it was paying attention, he pressed his hand against the table top. "Now the power of intangibility lets ghosts move through solid objects. Do you remember the definition of intangible?" This time he was asking to test out a specific theory on the clone's memory and learning speed.

"Yes Daddy, that which cannot be touched, incorporeal, impalpable." He answered as if reading out off of a book page.

_Just as I thought, its learning speed is keeping pace with his accelerated physical growth._ Vlad turned back to the table and phased his hand through the table surface. He slowly brought it back up, making sure the clone was focusing on how it looked. _Not that I'd have to worry about that with how focused it's looking at the moment._ He placed his now solid hand back on the top of the table. "Now D27, I want you to put your hand over mine, and I'm going to phase both of our hands through the table, so you can feel how it works." Vlad waited for the clone to follow the simple instructions, and spared a glance at his watch. Skulker was going to be here soon. He hadn't thought testing the clone's skills would take this long, so unfortunately, this training session was going to have to be cut short. Still, he needed to confirm a few things with the hunter before he could move forward with his newest plan. It had taken enough effort to get the Skeleton Key, so he had no intention of delaying for any reason except for a complete lack of information.

He had his hand over his Daddy's for a whole minute before it looked like he noticed. He was, what was the word…distracted?, by something else, though he couldn't guess what. Suddenly, his Daddy was focusing on him again, and he forgot all about Daddy not paying attention. Daddy said something about watching, so he looked down at his now, invisible-no it was still there, just kinda sparkly- hand. It went all the way through the table and then back up, a new tingly feeling coming from his hand as it did so.

"Alright, now I want you to try. Just do what I did, and you should be fine." Admittedly, Vlad wasn't fully engaged at the moment. He was busy calculating the rate of its growth against the increase in its vocabulary, reasoning skills, and other signs of intelligence. As far as he could tell, the clone's mental growth was keeping pace with or easily out pacing its physical growth. Some of it was expected, as its brain grew, so did its mental abilities, but the sponge like way its memory worked and its ability to synthesize new information was completely unusual. _Perhaps it responds to mental environmental stimuli more strongly than physical ones? If that's the case, the more it's exposed to new information, the faster it will learn._ The scientist in him had been so deeply involved, he hadn't noticed the clone struggling and failing to phase its hand through the table.

He'd been trying to get his hand through the lab table for the last several seconds, but nothing he tried seemed to work. He was about to ask for more help, when his Daddy spoke up.

"Having trouble are you? Ok, how about this. Instead of just pouring energy into your hand, try to concentrate on being untouchable. Objects can pass right through you. Try thinking about that when you use your ghost powers." Vlad guided before turning his thoughts back to another interesting gorgon's knot about the clone.

_Untouchable. I'm not here, I'm not solid, um, nothing can touch me._ He thought while focusing his spectral energy into the palm of his hand. His hand shimmered and started to slip through the table. Unfortunately, he got so excited that he lost concentration mid-way through, and his hand solidified inside the table. "Ah! No, don't!" D27 cried trying to tug his stuck hand from inside the table.

The clone's screaming brought him out of his reverie with a start. "Hm? Oh! Stop that, you're going to hurt yourself." Vlad reached over and grabbed the creature by the wrist. "If you get stuck inside something, just tugging won't get it out; you have to use intangibility again." He explained while using his own powers to extricate the clone's hand from the table. _Though that's sometimes easier said than done._ Vlad thought as memories of trying to get his own errant limbs from inside walls or furniture in the hospital came to mind.

"Well, well Plasmius. It has had ghost power all of eighteen hours, and it's already getting stuck in things. Maybe you should do a better job training the pup?" Skulker called from his place near the entrance to the training room. He'd watched as his employer barely taught the ghostling how to use its intangibility powers, mind apparently elsewhere.

"Oh Skulker, good," Vlad started while allowing the clone's now freed hand to solidify without the influence of his powers, "just the person I needed to talk to. D27, why don't you go upstairs to viewing area for the room and wait for me? I'll just be a second." He finished with a 'shooing' motion towards the exit of the room. One had to walk out the room to get to the stairs leading to the viewing portion of the training room with the data gathering computers. He didn't worry about the clone messing with the computer systems up there, they were all voice activated, and its voice wouldn't work the computers.

D27 frowned at being so quickly pushed away. He'd thought for sure, his Daddy would at least check to see he knew how to use the last power he'd tried to show him, but it looked like he didn't even care. "But-" He started before stopping short when he realized his Daddy wasn't even looking in his direction any more. It was pointless. He heaved a large sigh and started towards the door to the training room. He passed the stairs to the viewing room barely stopping to glance up them before deciding to walk around instead. He hadn't been very many place outside of the place where he slept or Daddy's, what was?-study, and he wanted to look around some more. He passed several doors. He quickly tried looking into them and found those rooms either full of boring looking furniture, or just plain empty. After the random searching didn't provide any fun, D27 decided to head back to his Daddy's study. He had some stuff to draw with in there. Something was pulling at his mind's eye to draw anyway. Last night, he'd seen the sun go down for the first time. It was so cool to look at, they sky had been red and orange and all kinds of other pretty colors. Naturally, he had rushed to find his sketching tools and made a rough picture of what the sky had looked like the night before.

At the moment he was sitting on the floor of his Daddy's study redrawing the efforts from last night. Now that he could sit still and think about it, D27 could remember all of the details, and the picture he'd quickly scribbled before didn't come close to how it looked in his head. So, there was no choice but to redo the entire thing, from memory this time, and without the distraction of watching it actually happening and the coolness of it all. _I wonder how long it'll be before Daddy notices I'm not in the upstairs room._ He thought with a small amount of anger. If the pattern was like he was used to, it would be hours. _It doesn't matter though; I have a lots of sketch makers and hours before bed time._ D27pondered before returning to his picture to pass the time.

* * *

><p>He met his Daddy a little before the dining room opening. He'd come racing down the stairs after one of the maids had told him dinner was ready. She'd apparently checked every room before finding him in the study, somewhere she wasn't supposed to go without permission. <em>I wonder why?<em> D27 thought as he bounded down the stairs full of energy. If it was anything like yesterday, it meant it was the only time he'd have his Daddy's full attention. No Ghost Skulker to hold his attention, no big business stuff to take care of, just him and Daddy for an hour or so before bed. Even though dinner was later than it was the day before, and it felt like his tummy was going to start growling like one of those big cats on the TV, it would be worth the wait to have his Daddy all to himself.

"Ah D27, good. I thought I might have to send someone for you." Vlad said as he met up with the clone a little before the dining room entrance. He'd left the thing several hours back, wanting to finalize some plans for the Ghost Zone with Skulker before it got any later. Between his work with the ghost hunter and his own distracted perusal of the data from the clone over the last 24 hours, diner was starting well over an hour and a half late. Still, he was done for the most part for the moment, only waiting on a call from his secretary to confirm the merger/hostile take-over was under way. Vlad settled into his place at the head of the table in front of a delicious looking medium rare rib eye steak, thick and creamy mashed potatoes, and a pile of peas.

The food in front of him didn't look all the good, and his chest still hurt from earlier that day. _I guess Daddy was right about using too much power._ D27 thought as he began to distractedly push food around his plate. He swallowed down some peas, before starting in on what he'd wanted to talk about all day since he'd seen the sun go down the day before. "So Daddy-" His sentence was interrupted by a loud ringing sound.

Vlad picked up his cell phone before it got to the third ring. He had been expecting a call from the Dalvco branch office for the last hour. _And of course they call right when I sit down for dinner._ Vlad noted with a roll of his eyes. "Yes, I'm here Cynthia. Do you have the last of the merger documents prepared?"

He had been about to talk about his day after he'd left Daddy in the lab with Skulker, when the pocket phone rang. As usual, Daddy was ignoring him for something or someone he thought was more important. He tried not to get discouraged, but sometimes he'd like it if he was the center of attention. "Daddy?"

"Shush. I'm busy right now. What? No Cynthia I'm not talking to you. So you're faxing over the documents now? Alright I'll get to them immediately, no no; I hadn't started yet, so it's fine." Vlad stood up smoothly from the head of the dining room table and began striding for the exit. "Oh," he held his hand over the phone, "D27, I have something I need to take care of really fast. You go on and start without me, I'll be right back." Vlad said over his shoulder already half-way up the stairs.

D27 pouted and began pushing his food half-heartedly around his plate again. _And Daddy promised to eat dinner with me too._ There just had to be some way to get his attention. Five minutes passed with him turning his mashed potatoes into a miniature volcano, complete with gravy lava and peas for boulders. _So boring. Maybe I can practice with my ghost powers._ He decided before trying out invisibility again. D27 quickly started turning his food and silverware invisible, but when that also proved dull, he started in on the glasses on the table. Seeing water "float" in the air was cool for a little while longer, but all of it eventually lost appeal, so he moved onto intangibility. Now, his hands turned intangible and everything just slipped through them. _No fun._ D27 concluded before getting up from his seat at the table. He walked around the room to Daddy's position at the table, wanting to "borrow" some nice looking lettuce pieces from his salad to sculpt with. He reached over for the fork, only to accidentally use his intangibility powers.

The fork went sailing through his fingers, and still having some spectral energy left, went part-way through the tablecloth as well. It stuck out at an odd thirty-five degree angle from the dining room table itself, partially imbedded when the intangibility wore off.

_Uh oh!_ D27 started trying to tug the fork out of its unnatural upright position. To no avail; it was stuck fast. He began to panic, the last thing he wanted was to get in trouble with his Daddy, and having the silverware coming out of the table would do it! When more pulling didn't seem to be getting him anywhere, the quickly growing child calmed down some and started thinking of his Daddy's words when his hand had gotten stuck earlier. _Well if ghost powers got it in there, maybe it can get it out._ He concentrated on the cool feeling inside his chest and pushed it out to his finger tips. Next he thought of being untouchable, like his Daddy had told him to. He watched as he fingers first drained of color, then turned invisible, and finally stopped feeling anything all together. D27 slowly reached out for the table in front of him, and was rewarded with his fingers passing cleanly through the solid wood.

He smiled at the soft tingle going through his fingers and reached for the fork stuck inside the table. The fork quickly turned intangible as well, slipping from inside the table and back out into D27's hand. Unfortunately, he was pulling so hard though, that he nearly fell over onto his rear. Fork now in hand, the young child almost wandered back to his place at the table when he got an idea. _Daddy left me all alone again. I think I'll make it up to him for leaving me…_ He walked back over to the opposite side of the table; fork still in hand, before setting it back in its place by the rest of the silverware. D27 stole a quick glance towards the entrance to the dining room before enacting his hastily thought out plan. It barely took any concentration this time to call forth his intangibility powers, so he was able to do so with his eyes open. He reached a shimmering incorporeal hand towards the large diner plate in front of him determination clear on his face. With only a second hesitation, he touched a single finger to the edge of the plate.

At first, nothing happened, the plate remained solid. After a moment though, the edge closest to his finger began to lose its creamy color, changing into the distinctly opaque shade of something cast with spectral energy. The taint spread from the original edge, downward, to the base of the ceramic piece. Slowly, the opaqueness spread all around the base, and back up the other side, meeting with the rest of it that had skittered across the upward facing part of the surface.

D27 wrapped his little hand around the lip of the lip and carefully lowered it through the table cloth and into the table. He quickly stopped using his ghost powers when the plate had reached the wanted depth.

It was imbedded into the table cloth and table, but it still looked like it was sitting on top of it, only the raised bottom of the expensive ceramic plate stuck inside the dining room furniture.

He smiled at how well his trick had succeeded, before performing a matching set of tricks on the glass and the salt and pepper shakers. Suddenly, he heard someone coming back towards the dining room. With hurried footsteps, he pushed away from his Daddy's side of the table and raced back towards his own, settling into the seat just as he heard someone end a conversation.

"Alright, thank you Cynthia. I'll see you back in the office in a few days, no; no I'll be alright just some family matters to take care of. I'll call you back later wanting an update on the merger." Vlad clicked the cell phone shut and stuffed it back into his pants pocket. A side-long glance across the room was met with a very quiet clone, still sitting at the table. Other than some playful food sculpting, it looked like his plate hadn't been touched. "D27, did I not tell you to start without me. I know you must be hungry." _You are practically eating enough for two grown men at the moment. God knows where you put it all. _

He gave Daddy his brightest smile. "I didn't want to start without you." If he hadn't smiled, he'd be laughing thinking about the little…what was-joke that he was about to play on his Daddy. He was sure Daddy wouldn't think it was funny, but he sure did.

Vlad gave the clone a small smile back before settling back into his place at the head of the table. "That's very nice of you, but you didn't have to do that. I've been gone for nearly 15 minutes, and I'm sure you're starving." He picked up his fork and started in on his own meal.

"Maybe, but I wanted to talk to you." D27 kicked his feet under the table, excited for whenever Daddy figured out his trick. _But I can't give it away by looking too wiggly!_ He thought before plunging into what he had wanted to say earlier. "I really like the croyans and pencils you got for me"

"Crayons." Vlad corrected gently.

"Yeah those thingies. I like them. I'm making a really pretty-um sketch of the sky when the sun went to sleep."

"Sunset."

"Yeah that! I'm not done with it yet, but I was thinking-"

"Yes that's very nice D27." Vlad said with a dismissive wave, spooning up some mashed potatoes. "Have you been practicing your ghost powers? I noticed you weren't in the viewing room like I told you to be earlier, so I assume you went somewhere to continue practicing with them."

He frowned at being interrupted, and at a time he shouldn't _have_ to be. But suddenly, the trick with his ghost powers came back to mind, and he felt a slow mischief filled smile work across his lips. "Oh yes Daddy, I have been. In fact, I think I'm getting better." He watched with growing excitement as his Daddy reached for the water filled glass nearest to him.

"That's wonderful." Vlad praised absently, half way to his glass of water next to his diner plate. He began lifting it up…only to find it wouldn't budge! Another tug had the exact same result, only this time the table cloth moved slowly with it. "What in the…?" He quickly turned the glass intangible to extricate it from the table. "Well that's odd, I don't recall…" _Well it's not like that's the first time something's ended up stuck in walls or furniture._

"Daddy, could you pass the pepper?" He was barely holding back giggles at this point. It was really too easy.

"The pepper?" Vlad questioned confused. Kids weren't known for having the most varied palettes and had even less tolerance for spice.

"Please? I just want to know what it tastes like…" He trailed off watching the hand snaked out and grabbed the pepper.

Just like the glass of water, the pepper was stuck fast. A few experimental tugs found it not just stuck in the table cloth, but through to the table as well. Vlad's head whipped around from the mysteriously steadfast pepper shaker to the giggling clone a few feet from him. He wasn't sure what surprised him more, the clone's level of control of powers it just learned hours before, or his lack of irritation at the trick it had just made him the unwitting victim of. "I see, so I suppose this," he said while gesturing to the rest of his side of the table, now sure it was also equally ensnared, "is your doing?"

D27 gripped his aching tummy, another fit of giggles escaping out of his mouth. It'd had taken a lot to hold them all back before. "Yup!" He stifled another set of giggles and pushed away from the table. "And for my final trick," he reached for the table cloth and focused. He felt the tingle of cool spectral energy travel from his core to his hands and into the cloth. With on hard yank, he pulled the now untouchable cloth off of the wooden piece revealing his earlier handiwork. "Tada!" He said with a wave of the cloth through the air, partially wrapped around his middle, somehow having gotten tangled during the removal process.

Vlad glanced down at the table noting with the growing warmth of approval the partially imbedded salt and pepper shakers and his dinner plate. "Very good, very good indeed. I see you _have _improved. I suppose I do deserve a little of this for leaving you alone-"

"And igsnoring me for Ghost Skulker earlier."

"_Ignoring_, and yes for that too I suppose." Vlad said while slipping from his seat and walking towards the clone's side of the room. He watched as it sleepily rubbed at its eyes. The older hybrid leaned over and picked up the still giggling and wriggling clone, removing the wrapped table cloth with a bit of intangibility. "Come on its time for bed, it's already almost 8:30 since we started dinner so late." He felt the clone wrap his thin little arms around his neck and settle against his body. Vlad frowned at the still nearly full plate of food on its side of the table. "Did you eat anything?" He wondered into its dark locks, the clone's head currently trying to snuggle deeper under his chin.

"Nuh, I had some cow and the green round thingies." D27 answered in a slur, nearly asleep.

Vlad's frown deepened. The clone usually ate a lot more than that. In fact, whenever it decided it wasn't hungry, a few minutes to an hour later, it was trying to melt. The lack of eating wasn't really the best of signs; however, it might have just been emotionally based. _I hope._ He didn't feel like dealing with another melting emergency at the moment. The elder halfa started down the steps to his secret lab. The clone still slept in there, and probably would until the fastest part of his growing stage was finished. That meant another day or so in the lab; however, he already had a bedroom upstairs ready for it to move into after he was sure it was more stable. Vlad set the already nodding off clone onto its bed in the lab, moving away from the bedside almost immediately.

"Wait…" D27 reached blindly out towards where he'd last felt his Daddy. He didn't want to sleep alone in the, what did Daddy call it? The _laboratory_ or something like that. Such a big word for the place he slept. It was cold and metally though, the monsters could be back from last night, and so he didn't want his Daddy to leave him just yet. "Can't stay here…with 'till sleep?" He knew that didn't make much sense, but he was so tired from using his powers all day that he couldn't manage much better.

Vlad eyed the comfy arm chair that was quickly becoming a favorite of his next to the work console in this part of the lab. His secretary wasn't going to be expecting a call until early tomorrow morning; Skulker was off collecting the last of the information on the Ancients he'd asked for, and he really had nothing to do at the moment. _And it asked so nicely too._ Vlad thought with a small mental sigh before heading over to scoot the armchair closer.

He heard the soft scuffing of movement for a few seconds before it stopped and he could feel someone close by. D27 opened a bleary sleep weighted eye and turned his head towards the noise. His Daddy was only a few feet away, in the big comfy chair and a big grown up book, the kind with the big words and small letters. He smiled before closing his barely opened eye and settling in for a good long sleep.

Vlad paused in reading through his book to glance down at the now sleeping clone. It looked to fragile, even more so than usual, when it slept, and with the threat of a melt-down looming, he didn't want to leave its side. He sighed and settled in for another few hours of sleep in the semi-upright position of the arm chair.

* * *

><p><strong>Balshumet: And that's the end of this chapter. Aww isn't he a cutey? And a little trickster too! The good news is, I've got the next chapter already written for this story, and it's going to be released this Sunday! The bad news is, any of my readers here who also read over at <span>Bittersweet<span> will notice lack of activity over on that story. I haven't gotten around to the newest chapter for that story again. It's a plot doozy, and my life has been hectic. At the very least though, I can promise there will be another writing release from me this coming week, whether or not that chapter gets written.(I'm going for yes on the getting written) Also to my American readers, Happy Independence Day everyone! I'm American so I'm ready to celebrate with BBQ, family, and colorful explosive that are barely legal. I'll see you this coming Sunday, and as always my lovelies R&R.  
><strong>


	3. Artwork, Stories, and Questions

**Balshumet: Ok! Welcome to the third chapter of Beloved, wherein I actually update at least one of my stories once a week. XD I'll be addressing that at the bottom of the page. I owe you guys several chapters since I'm behind on my twice a month updating schedule I was hoping on for this story. Plus, I've decided this one makes more sense as a shorter chaptered story, so expect 7-9k words a chapter here. (This is shorter chaptered as compared to, say, Bittersweet, where the chapters are all like 12k+long it seems now a days.) Now for the Disclaimer:**

**I, Balshumet, being of sound body, and nearly sound mind, do so solemnly swear that not a piece of Danny Phantom is my own. It is all the property, intellectual or otherwise, of Butch Hartman, Nick, and Viacom. Please support the official release. **

**And now without further ado, the story. Cya at the Bottom!  
><strong>

* * *

><p><strong><span>Artwork, Stories, and Questions<span>****  
><strong>

The day was shining up to be a good one. It was bright and clear, the air cool and crisp this late in autumn the first signs of winter were peaking through. Most of the trees were beginning to show bare branches through their changing colors, and there was a soft frost on the ground over night most nights now. Deep in Vlad's underground lab though, between the depth underground and the equipment giving off heat, it was a toasty near 80. The clone was seated a few feet from his small bunk scribbling quick pictures of the rest of the house as it came to mind.

It was early, nearly 6am, but he couldn't sleep. He had trouble sleeping for more than a few hours at once, and with nothing else to do, he found ways to keep himself occupied. His Daddy was likely up by now, but he wouldn't be downstairs in the lab for a few more minutes, and with the ghost portal closed, Ghost Skulker wouldn't be visiting either. So he did what he usually did when bored, drew. He was getting sorta good at it too, at least in his thoughts. The sketches were starting to actually look like what he'd been trying to draw. _Maybe I could get Daddy to look at them later?_ D27 pondered while finishing off a simple drawing of the dining room from the night before. He set it aside and rubbed at his chest. It still hurt. He was thinking about telling Daddy when he got downstairs. It seemed kinda bad that his chest still hurt after yesterday, even if he did use a whole lot of power. Something told him it still shouldn't hurt. D27 shrugged it off and walked back towards his bed. He had more art supplies there…

Vlad stretched coffee in hand, as he headed for his private study. The entrance to the lab was in there, and besides that, his secretary was in New York finishing up the merger, which was more like a willing take-over, with the smaller company gladly becoming a subsidiary of Dalvco. New York was a solid two time zones ahead, and so despite the hour at his Wisconsin home, he was expecting a call from her. _Stupid time zones; how can it already be 8am over there?_ He wondered blearily. He usually didn't mind being up early, but the constant supervision the clone required was beginning to take it out of him. He couldn't wait until this growth phase slowed and stopped completely in another two weeks max, because then he'd be able to get back on a normal sleep schedule. The weary billionaire reached for the phone on his study desk before settling into the plush leather chair behind it. He was about to punch in the few buttons needed to connect him to his secretary in New York, when a clarion alarm rang through the house, loud and urgent. Vlad had his hand on the left football player before his conscious mind had really caught up with him. That alarm only meant one thing, and time was precious for the next few minutes.

The pain was unbearable. In the few seconds it had taken to walk from his comfy spot made of repurposed bed sheets on the floor back towards his bed the pain in his chest had spread everywhere. Before he knew what hit him, D27 was curled up in a ball on the floor, a scream frozen on his still shocked lips. The pain came in waves originating in his chest and moving towards the tips of his fingers and toes, and just when he thought it couldn't get any worse, he felt his toes tingle and burn then it felt like someone poured boiling _and_ icy water over them. He cracked a scared eye open and felt absolute fear grip his mind. Where he last saw his toes there was now a growing pool of green _slime_. Worse, it was traveling up his feet, like the slime was eating more of him as it went. His mind screamed out that he needed to get away from the growing pool of slimy glowing awful stuff eating him, but he was in too much pain to move. Just as the slime reached his ankles, he heard a door upstairs slam closed, and it frightened him out of his terrified stupor enough to scream, "_Daddy!"_ He didn't know what was happening, but he knew he needed his Daddy _now._

Vlad rushed down the last of the stairs, and was half way through the front part of the lab when he heard the clone scream for him. It sounded so pained and terrified, he nearly teleported the last few feet just to save time. He decided against it, knowing he needed to keep a level head to stave off any serious damage. "Maddie, I need a live vital feed on the clone now! And while you're at it, splice in the information from the Nanites, get some of that stabilizer I made earlier out of the chiller and onto the console in the back room, and make sure you highlight which segments of DNA are going haywire for me, I don't have the time to waste figuring it out at the moment." He spoke hastily into the quickly hologram materializing air in front of him. Vlad strode purposefully into the back of the lab and zeroed in on the distraught clone's position on the floor instantly. It looked like it was trying to crawl away from the growing pool of its own ectoplasm. "D27, stop moving right now! You're making it worse, so stay still." He commanded before rushing over to it to hold it still. He got its attention when his hand gripped its arm to root it firmly to the ground. The tear and fear filled gaze that met Vlad's own made him rethink his position about the clone's utter lack of personhood. "You have to stay still, it's _very_ important that you don't stress yourself out more right now. Stay still for Daddy ok?" Vlad soothed while scanning through the floating work-up of the clone's system in front of him.

"Clone's stability at 72% and dropping, the culprit seems to be lack of energy honey bun. Nanites can't correct, immediate fusion of energy necessary." The Maddie hologram supplied from across the room near the large computer console on the opposite end of the room. "Genetic Stabilizer would be ineffective in this instance, lamb chops, my suggestion is to give it some of your energy to jump start the stabilization process. Clone's stability 65% and dropping…"

Vlad's frown deepened as he skimmed through the information in front of him. _Looks like my guess about the melting wasn't incorrect after all._

The clone's ghostly core was flickering on and off, barely able to produce enough energy to hold it together at the moment. Unlike normal ghost hybrids, well if a sample size of two counted, the clones were basically balls of willed ectoplasm with human DNA mixed in. If Vlad or Danny ran out of ghost energy, they just couldn't transform or use their powers for a few hours. They essentially became completely human for a while. Clones, however, were much more like ghosts. They needed a constant supply of spectral energy to remain stable, unlike normal ghosts though, they produced their own, like a regular half ghost.

The older halfa came to a decision as the melting portion of the clone reached mid-shin in height and its stability dropped below 55%. He took a deep breath and summoned a small amount of gentle blue spectral energy, holding it out for the clone in front of him. "Now D27, look at me…" he trailed off as he felt the clone pull against his hold. Vlad squeezed a little harder and said forcefully, "D27. Look. At. Me." Slowly, much more slowly than he was comfortable with, the clone forced its eyes away from the growing pool of glowing green sludge and towards him.

The pain was getting worse by the second and he was so scared he could barely breathe. Even though he could hear his Daddy talking to him, it was so hard to think or listen through how bad he felt right then…but then it had to be really important, so he tried to focus. _Daddy has to be trying to fix it._ D27 reasoned before tearing his wide eyes and tear streaked face away from the green stuff currently eating his legs.

"Good boy. Now, I need you to give me one of your hands, it doesn't matter which one. Reach for the glowing blue ball ok? You're going to feel a cold tingle, and the blue ball is going to disappear slowly alright?" Vlad explained as simply and slowly as he could manage at the moment. Even he was surprised by the calm cool tone of his voice; inside he was a notch short of full blown panic. The clone was under 50% stable and falling quickly. The last thing he wanted to do was start all over when this one was so promising. He studiously ignored the niggling sense telling him it was something more than scientific pursuit and unwillingness to start over fueling his worry. He felt a wave of relief as the clone reached out for the softly pulsating ball of blue ecto-energy with its hand…

The burning icy boiling feeling was all the way to his knees now, and it took every bit of concentration he had to ignore it and listen to Daddy talk. He said something about a glowing blue ball, and he finally noticed it sitting in his Daddy's free hand. He would have started if he had the energy, but instead of a gasp all that came out was an aborted cry. He gritted his teeth and reached out for the ball like he was told, and hoped this would make it better. He had just about reached the ball, when the tingling burn started up in his fingers as well. With a scream made of pain and surprise, he watched as his fingers turned into more of the awful green eating stuff as well. "Daddy make it stop _please._"

Now more worried about the clone melting than overloading its system, Vlad placed his energy loaded hand onto the clone's chest and pressed it into its failing core. For a couple breath stealing seconds, the melting process seemed to get _faster_, but just as he was about to truly panic; the melting stopped and began to reverse.

The pool of green beneath the clone grew thicker and reabsorbed into the creature's system. The reclaimed ectoplasm quickly reformed limbs, right down to the missing digits on its hands and feet.

Vlad poured a few extra seconds of energy into its body before carefully removing his hand from its chest. He swiftly gave it a once over, checking for any visible damage or changes to its structure, and was relieved to find none. "Maddie, analysis, how's its vitals look?" He questioned into empty space.

"Clone fully stabilized. Ghost core is producing sufficient energy to remain stable indefinitely pumpkin, and there are no deleterious or neutral changes to the clone's DNA." The blue spandex clad Maddie hologram pronounced.

The errant scientist's shoulder sagged in visible relief. That had been a close one. _I suppose it would have been easier if it had just cooperated._ Vlad concluded with a small frown, before refocusing on the clone besides him on the floor. He finally noticed he was still fiercely gripping its arm. He let go, and noted with concern the dark purple bruise blossoming across its surface shaped like the palm of his hand. Still more concerning was the lack of noising coming from the clone itself. Despite the fact it had just melted and reformed, something he was sure must be painful, it hadn't made a peep since it began to solidify again. It hadn't even reached over for a hug or comfort of some sort, and the continued silence was both unnerving and worrying. "D27?" Vlad ventured softly, reaching out to brush a few stray hairs off of its face.

The pain in his chest was mostly gone now, but even the fading echoes of the hurt didn't distract him from what just happened. Suddenly, he could remember all the other bad times this had happened, and it was overwhelming. Sometimes his Daddy would inject him with something, something that hurt like crazy, but that made the… the like cheddar cheese wilting on his potatoes last night, stop. Others it would stop on its own after a few hurt filled minutes. All of it was bad and scary, and worse it all happened at different times. There was nothing he could remember that happened right before or that could warn him about it. It just _happened_, and then…_then Daddy fixes it._ He felt shivers work up his back and the cold bumps show up on his arms. _I need a hug._ D27 concluded before he heard his Daddy call out to him. He swiveled fear filled and tear brimmed eyes back towards the only constant in his life. Before he knew it, he was flinging himself into his Daddy's open arms. There were a more questions than he had fingers and toes he wanted to ask, but they could wait until after he wasn't so scared anymore.

Vlad relaxed into the now more responsive clone's arms. He felt it wordlessly practically meld itself into his chest, a ball of fear and insecurity. "Shush, it's alright D27, there's nothing to be frightened of." _Now._ Vlad added mentally before continuing, "You're just fine. I'm here; nothing's going to happen to you." He reached over and gently patted its back, trying to calm the nearly hysterical combination of wailing and tears the little creature had turned into in an instant.

"Buh Daddy, the green stuff almost eated me, and it really hurt, and it happened before-"

"What did? And no nothing was _eating_ you D27, the green liquid wasn't eating you. It's-"

"The green stuff tried to eat me before, and you stopped it." The young boy insisted.

"D27, I'm telling you, nothing was trying to eat you." _What it is with small children and being terrified of being devoured? _"You were destabilizing." Vlad answered truthfully. It wasn't as if the clone would understand what it meant, even if he was entirely honest with it.

"Destabilize, to upset the stability or equilibrium of; unbalance." He quoted dictionary perfect. "Daddy why was I becoming unbalanced? I don't remember feeling unbalanced, just hurting."

Vlad was beginning to regret letting it read that dictionary in the first place. "Your ghost core wasn't making enough energy to keep you stable." He watched the clone's already big doe eyes widen even further. "But," he quickly interrupted the blubbering spilling forth from its trembling lips, "it's not something you have to worry about." Vlad started quickly trying to change the subject.

"Why would it? It has you to worry about it for him." A metallic voice echoed from the fore of the lab.

"Ghost Skulker!" D27 said happily, wriggling out of his Daddy's arms to go run over to the floating metal specter. With the distraction of the metal covered hunter ghost, he had completely forgotten about the green eating stuff from a few minutes ago.

"Oh alright, just leave me here why don't you." Vlad teased before giving his house coat a once over. It was filthy, covered in the remnants of the clone's green ectoplasm. He barely suppressed a grimace as he worked his way off of the floor. "Ok D27, why don't you stay here with Skulker for a few minutes while I change?" He watched as the clone's face dropped from a shy and excited smile to a scared wide eyed look. "Now, now, there's nothing to worry about. You'll be just fine here for a few minutes, I promise you won't do any more melting. Skulker will be right here with you, I just need some clean clothes alright?" Vlad didn't wait for a real response; he was already walking towards the lab entrance. "Skulker keep the little thing entertained why don't you?" He offered over his shoulder jogging up the entrance stairs, ready for a quick change of clothes.

Skulker stared uncomfortably at the little ball of cloned ectoplasm in front of him. It was even bigger than the last time he'd seen it, and worse, it looked _needy_. If his guess was correct, the thing had just tried to melt, and was understandably very unhappy about the whole thing. Unfortunately, Skulker wasn't the nurturing type. He much preferred to just kill small, and in other beings' opinions cute, things about the clone's size to watching over them. They were annoying and required a lot of care, two things that he hated. _But Plasmius has charged me with caring for the little whelp, so I might as well distract it or something. At least if it isn't thinking about how it nearly just died, it'll stop looking like it wants some kind of affection._ Skulker decided before looking down at the still watery eyed creature. "So…" He started only to stop short. He had no idea what the creature was liked or even what it understood, and so had no idea what to talk about. While he was fumbling for a quick idea, the reason for his visit came to mind. "Have you ever heard of the Ghost Dragon King pup?" He noted with triumph the way the creature's eyes started to shine with interest instead of tears. He took its silence for the 'no' it was, before plunging forward with his tale. "Well, you're in for a real treat, because I was there the day he died. You see your…father, Plasmius, got into a fight on behalf of this female…"

Vlad sighed and sagged into the top of his mattress. That had been the worse melting episode so far. Not because of the severity, but because of the clone's reaction. Previously, the thing had either been asleep or too small to remember anything from the melting episodes. Now, it seemed like it remembered not only the instance that just occurred, but several from the past he was sure it hadn't recorded. _Looks like it just repressed it. Fantastic. It's not even a week old and it has repressed memories. You should win 'Father of the Year' in no time like this Vlad._ He sighed and banished the thought, not least of all for the implications of even being eligible to win an award for fatherhood. All of the stress from the constant attention the clone needed to make it through a single day had just about drained his reserves. Not only did the thing have a habit of destabilizing in the middle of the night and early morning, when he should be asleep instead of tending to it, it was also a rambunctious child, which made watching over it a trial to begin with.

_The only good thing to come out of this day so far is the fact this is the final day of accelerated growth at this level. After that, it should be much more stable, and in fact, it should be able to sleep upstairs in its own room tonight._ The thought brought some energy back into his system, not only for the relief from the level of vigilance it required of him, but because it marked a serious accomplishment for his cloning work. No other clone had ever stayed this humanoid and stable for this long before. Vlad once again ignored the illogical affectionate warmth spreading through his chest at the thought of the clone's excitement and joy. It didn't really matter yet if it was happy; maybe it would in another week or so. With a huff of semi-energized air, he pushed himself off of the bed and finally padded towards his closet. He needed to get back downstairs. _Leaving_ _Skulker with small defenseless creatures for any period of time isn't the best of decisions…_

"So then the Dragon King flew down at Plasmius at full speed. I tell you my very core nearly stopped in fear when I saw the malevolent gleam in his eyes. He drew his head back and took a breath so deep, you could feel the air around you moving 100 yards away. Finally, he let out a veritable _wall_ of deep green flames, heading straight for your father. I watched with growing dread as Plasmius didn't so much as budge from his spot on the arena floor!" Skulker paused for dramatic effect, enjoying the enraptured look on the little clone's face.

"And _then_ what happened?" He just _had_ to hear the end of this story. It couldn't stop there; his Daddy might be burnt to a crisp!

Skulker smiled widely before picking up the story where he left off, "the flames came crashing down all around him, engulfing him in their licking tendrils and burning grasp." He paused once again when he heard the clone gasp and begin to bounce up and down nervously. The hunter spared it the wait, though, and immediately started the story back up. "For a full ten seconds, there was nothing but deep green flames surrounding the whole of the courtyard, and I thought for sure Plasmius was but a cinder of ectoplasm. Then, suddenly, the flames gave way, and inside you could see this swirling hot mass of _red_ ectoplasm shaped like a dome. Your father had constructed a shield of solid _red_ ecto-energy, er if you didn't know; red energy is both rare and hard to control. I've only ever _heard_ of beings wielding it before I saw Plasmius actually do so. In any case," Skulker moved pasted the little tangent, "the fires were practically eaten away by the strength of the pulsing shield around him, and the Dragon King roared with frustration. He flew around for another pass, willing himself to go even faster, before Plasmius surprisingly dropped his shield."

"Why?" He didn't want to interrupt, but putting down the only thing keeping you from being set on fire didn't seem like a good idea.

"Hold your horses, I'm getting to it!" Skulker bellowed at the impatient child. _What is taking Plasmius so long?_ He wondered before heading towards the end of the battle. "Inside was a double of your father and he had a dark red sphere of energy in his palm. Then I felt a tingle travel through my suit, and the air around me charged with energy. I heard something crackle through the air, and it began to smell like a rain storm. That's when I realized, Plasmius was charging an electrical attack! The static discharge from the blast grew as the attack grew in power, and quickly several of the female's hair were practically floating straight up. He charged a second attack with the other version of himself, and the air took on a strong metallic taste and smell. The Dragon King had just flown into position to charge at him at full speed, and was already inhaling what felt like half of the air in the arena. Luckily ghosts don't need to breathe! The two of them stared each other down for a hair's breadth, before they threw their attacks at each other. And then-"

"Skulker what in the world are you talking about?" Vlad had just made it back into the lab, and had only caught the tail end of Skulker's last sentence.

"Why you glorious defeat of the Ghost Dragon King of course! I was about to get to the good part too."

"Really?" He practically screamed. He didn't think it could get any better than this.

"Skulker…" Vlad trailed off as he took in the eager and antsy look on the clone's face. "Don't you think this is an inappropriate story for a child?" He wasn't sure why he was even asking. _As if Skulker knows what is appropriate behavior around children anyway. _Vlad thought with a roll of his eyes.

"What do you mean Plasmius? Is not a tale of your victorious battle not the perfect story for your whelp to hear?"

"Perhaps if it wasn't so violent and filled with so much gore and death. Couldn't you have picked something else to talk about?"

"But I wanna hear the end of the story Daddy! Pretty please? You were just about to hit the mean evil Dragon King with a big electreecal attack." D27 whined up at his Daddy with the biggest saddest looking eyes he could muster.

"_Electrical_," Vlad corrected, "and no. The story is about to get very-"

"Aw come on Plasmius, it's a great story!" Skulker interrupted. He had just about gotten to his favorite part.

"Maybe for a bar full of harden ghosts, or a something, but not for a barely 5 year old child." Skulker looked about ready to argue the point when Vlad held up a hand. "_No_ Skulker. He'll be having nightmares for a week, and I'll be the one dealing with them. I don't want to be up all night when I don't have to be." Vlad said in a voice that brokered no arguments.

Skulker smirked widely before saying, "Why Plasmius, I didn't know you cared. You're even calling the clone 'he' instead of 'it' now. What were you telling me about it being an experiment two days back?" He gloated freely.

The older halfa frowned before retorting, "A slip of the tongue. Now, since you want to talk about the ancient ghosts, I assume you've found the location of Pariah's Keep like I asked."

"Oh certainly. In fact, it's the entire reason I'm over here, but are you sure you need that crown?" Skulker wasn't really comfortable with the thought of waking the ancient King up for any reason, but he trusted Plasmius to keep the situation under control. At least enough to keep _him_ from getting killed, and the payment for the information, in the form of a brand new suit and new weapons, was too much to pass up for just handing over some Intel.

"Of course I am. I'm going to need that-"

_Oh no. Not this time._ He wasn't being brushed off again for some stupid conversation with Ghost Skulker about stuff he didn't care about. He'd waited a whole day to show Daddy his sketch, and he was doing it this time. Now more determined than ever, D27 walked over to his space in the back of the lab and snatched up the nearly finished picture before marching purposefully back into the front of the lab. He stood in between the talking adults with purpose and lifted and wiggled his art project in the air above him. When neither of them reacted, he lowered the paper and called, "Hey!"

"Hm what?" Vlad paused in his conversation with his ghostly associate and looked down at the frowning face of the clone between them. He noticed the piece of paper in its hands and immediately began to brush it off. "Now D27, Daddy is busy. He'll look at…your picture later."

"_No,_" he started emphatically, "now. You're going to look at it right now. You promised Daddy." He managed to not whine a bit while saying any of the sentences, settling for an angry tone of voice instead.

The billionaire frowned deeply. He was not about to be commanded by a small child for any reason. "No D27, I will not. I-"

"That's not fair. You never keep your promises!" Now he was actually upset. Nothing he did seemed to get his Daddy to listen or pay attention to him, and he was sick of being…_ignored, _that was the word.

He was about to reprimand the little clone when Skulker interrupted.

"Oh come on Plasmius, the sooner you look at the thing's doodle, the sooner we can get back to our conversation."

"It's not a doodle, it's a _sketch_, and you promised you'd look at it today. Remembeer? You promised after training last day."

"_Remember_, and the word you are looking for is yesterday." Vlad corrected while contemplating the wisdom of giving into the clone's childish request. Seeing no reason to put it off any longer, he leaned over and picked up the page from the creature's grasp. He had been prepared to just dismiss the drawing outright after a quick glance over to satisfy the clone. Instead, he found himself staring intently at the page. _The level of skill…_

Although the sketch had been made with crayons and colored pencils, not the most sophisticated of artistic instruments; the composition was fairly well made. It was a vivid representation of the Wisconsin sunset from the night before. The sky was a rich combination of bright reds and oranges with hints of purple at the top edge of the page. The sun was the center piece of the picture, and unlike most typical childish representations of the star, it didn't have any lines coming off of the deep red sphere. It hung low on the horizon, disappearing behind the slowly rising fog common in the evenings of autumn in the area. The ground was an interesting mix of greens, browns and red from the light of the sun collecting in the low hanging fog.

If he had to guess the age of the person who'd the sketch in his hand, he'd have thought at least middle school aged. The attention to detail and specific pieces chosen to be showcased demonstrated a level of artistic talent and practice well beyond the barely five years of age, but literally three day old, clone waiting silently beneath him. "D27, you made this?" It was more a rhetorical question borne from a sensation of being impressed than anything else.

He smiled brightly and nodded his head. "It took me a really long time, but I think it came out pretty. I'm not done with it though." He finished, his face melding into a small frown. "I still need to, um, sign it. Like all the painting in the house, but…I don't know how."

"What do you-" Vlad practically slammed his free hand into his forehead. _Of course. I only taught it to __**read**__ yesterday._ "Oh well, writing is easy. Listen, I have to finish talking to Skulker, but right after that, I'll show you how to write, and you can finish your sketch." He offered while handing the picture back down to the enthused face of the young clone next to him.

"OK! I'll go fix my bed so I'll be ready when you come back." He barely stopped to grab his sketch from his Daddy's hand before running back towards his space in the lab.

The older hybrid chuckled as he watched the clone race out of the room. "Now," he said turning back to the metal clad hunter, "where were we?" He asked before he noticed the odd stare Skulker was giving him. "What?" He snapped impatiently.

"Oh nothing Plasmius, you just seem awfully excited over the creature's little _doodle_."

Vlad had to stop himself from telling Skulker it was a sketch. Instead he just responded, "Did you get a good look at it? It was rather good for someone who's only been drawing all of three days don't you think?" He didn't wait for a reply, but instead plunged right ahead. "Admittedly, the construction materials were childish, but the composition was interesting and displayed-oh shut up Skulker." Vlad stopped himself from continuing to praise the clone's picture when the grin on his ally's face only widened.

"What? I haven't said a word. In fact, you've said enough for the both of us about the pup's little picture." Skulker was enjoying rubbing his employer's obvious affection back into his face. Especially after he'd made the point of being so detached the two days before. _It looks like the ghostling is growing on him._ He concluded with a few extra internal snickers.

"Nevermind." Vlad snapped back waspishly. "So you're sure you have every piece of available information? I don't want to be surprised when I arrive." He mentioned quickly changing the subject. _I do __**not**__ care more than necessary for that little ball of ecto-goo._

"I'm sure Plasmius. You're lucky there's even _this_ much information around. Heck, he was imprisoned over a millennia ago. Anyway, if that's all you need, I'll be heading back home. I saw a golden spotted ecto-bob cat on the way here, and I don't yet have a matching set of male and female for that species yet." Skulker said eagerly.

Vlad gestured towards the open ghost portal. "Be my guest. I'll call on you in another two weeks or so, before I head over to Pariah's Keep."

"What for?" Not that he minded Plasmius requesting his help, he was always well compensated for it, but he was frankly curious about what he wanted. _He had better not tell me to go with him to that death trap._ Skulker considered with worry.

"I don't want to leave D27 alone for any large period of time, so you'll be keeping an eye on him for me. Don't worry; you'll be compensated of course, but-"

"Plasmius I am _not_ some kind of baby-sitting service. Leave a duplicate of yours here or something to watch it." The hunter was not about to degrade himself by watching small children.

"It'll be nearly Daniel's age by then, so it's not going to need serious watching over, I just need someone around who knows the technical of working my systems, just in case it tries to destabilize. Besides, I'll need all my energy for going through Pariah's Keep, unless you'd like to accompany me?"

"No! I can watch the whelp. You are sure it'll no longer be so small in two weeks?" When faced with the option of either flying into certain near lethal level danger, or watching some pup for a few hours, the choice was clear.

"Of course. I'm glad we are in agreement." _As if there was ever any other option._ Vlad concluded smugly. "I'll see you in two weeks then. Don't look so glum, I promise I'll train the clone to have much better manners than anything Daniel can muster." With that, he watched the frowning hunter float through the ghost portal, and disappear back into the zone. Now much more curious about what his quickly growing experiment was up to, Vlad turned away from the hypnotic swirling greens of the portal and back towards the back of the lab.

He'd waited as patiently as he could for nearly five minutes, before he'd found something else to do other than staring at the now completely clean floor of the lab. The little blue hologram that showed up sometimes when Daddy talked was floating in front of him now. Chatting happily with D27 about how pretty the sky had been last night, and the few messier scribbles he'd made earlier when he was bored. "I think I'm go to do this one again, but much better." He said while holding up a picture of his Daddy in ghost form arms crossed, an imagined wind blowing back his white and red cape. He watched the hologram smile and nod, obviously pay attention. "But what I really want to draw is the really cool, um, battle between Daddy in that mean ghost dragon thingy, it's just…I don't know what a dragon looks like." D27 concluded with a huff, a frown marring his previously bright features.

"Oh that's simple! I have lots of pictures of dragons you can look at." With that the hologram's image was replaced with a large collage of various dragons from all over the world. There were East Asian dragons, classic European dragons, and even some pictures of South American dragonish figures.

"If you want to know," Vlad started from behind the pair, "the Dragon King looks a lot more like this one." He stated while pointing to an especially impressive black European dragon in the mass of pictures.

"Daddy!" He didn't know what was better, that his Daddy was actually paying attention to him without him having to cry or scream or something bad, or that he'd actually kept his promise this time. "Mrs. Computer was showing me some dragon pictures, oh and she showed me how to sign my name." D27 held up the newly completed sketch of the sunset, with a squiggly solitary letter and two numbers at the bottom right corner.

Vlad chuckled at the barely legible script at the bottom of the picture. "Yes that's very nice. He blinked when the clone practically shoved the sketch back into his hands. "What-"

"It's for you. I want you to keep it." He said with a big smile. He hoped Daddy liked it. "I wanna make more, but um, I'm almost out of sketch making stuff."

"Art supplies," Vlad offered casually. "Of course I'll get you some more. In fact, I'll have someone pick some nice watercolor paints in the morning." _As messy as those are._ "And you're sure you want me to have it? You worked very hard on it, and I was thinking you could keep it in your room." Vlad said carefully picking the clone up from the floor.

D27 glanced around the lab with an unhappy pout. "Of course I do! That's why I worked so hard on it. I already have lots of pictures in here with me; I don't need the good ones to stay here."

"Ah, but D27, I didn't mean here." The older halfa watched as its eyes lit up with curiosity. "There's a nice space upstairs with your name on it, oh not literally," he added when the clone began to look confused, "but it _is_ just for you. Would you like to see it?" He carefully balanced the clone on his hip and stalked towards the exit of the lab.

"You mean I don't have to stay here tonight?" He watched as the space he'd made in the back of the lab disappeared farther from view. It made his tummy feel like there was something wiggling in it. He did want to sleep outside of the lab; it was cold and made lots of beeping noises. On the other hand, he'd never slept anywhere else, as far as he could remember, so the thought of doing so wasn't as fun as he imagined it would be.

"Not unless you want to." Vlad added when he noticed the nervous energy coming off of the clone. "But why don't you take a look at the room before you decide?" _Honestly why in the world does it __**want**__ to sleep in a cold impersonal lab over a nice decorated room, I can't fathom._ He rounded the corner taking him away from the study and back towards the front part of the house. He'd had a room set up after the clone had fully solidified out of its growing pod about five days before. It was generic kid friendly, with enough personality and bright colors to entice most small children. _I'm sure it'll want to make changes as soon as it's settled._

"Oh, ok I guess." He decided. During the last part of the walk to the room, something he'd put off before came back to mind. Skulker and Mrs. Computer had called him something weird. And when he thought about it, Daddy did too sometimes. He knew what the word meant; he just didn't know why they kept calling him that. "Daddy, why does Ghost Skulker and Mrs. Computer keep calling me 'clone'?"

The elder hybrid nearly dropped the clone in surprise when he heard its question. He hadn't expected the question for awhile yet, perhaps never if he was honest with himself. It wasn't something he was keen on explaining. "Oh well, don't worry about it, it's not really that important."

"But it _is_ Daddy. Ghost Skulker keeps saying it, and you do too. If 'clone' means to make a copy of, or an individual produced by cloning, then who am I a copy of?" It had been bothering him for the last day or so, and he really wanted an answer.

_I definitely hate that dictionary. What was I thinking?_ "I…" His first instinct was to blatantly lie. To tell it wasn't a clone at all. That it had misunderstood. But the _way_ it was looking at him made it nearly impossible. "I promise, I will tell you later. Just not right now ok? I don't want you worrying about it, but if it really bothers you, I'll tell you in a few days." _At least by then it will be much older, so maybe it'll understand better._

That wasn't the answer he wanted, and his Daddy didn't always keep his promises, but he'd kept his last one, so maybe he would this time too. "Ok…" He rested his head against his Daddy's shoulder right as he stopped in front of a door. The door opened with a slight creak and on the other side was the coolest room he'd ever seen. There were cool colorful pictures on the walls of big bright green lizards, and the bed had red cars all over the sheets. The floor was a bright blue carpet that matched the walls, the ceiling was sky blue with little white clouds on it, and the background of the bed sheets too. D27 started to wiggle, wanting to see the room for himself.

"Oh alright, there." Vlad set the clone down onto the floor and watched it bolt for the bed. He suppressed laughter as it practically bounced off the walls in excitement. He started when he felt his cell phone buzz, then the reason for it hit him. _I was supposed to call Cynthia._ In between the near melting episode, and talking with Skulker, he'd forgotten why he'd woken up extra early today in the first place. "Now D27, I have to take this call, but I'll be back in a little bit so you can tell me what you think of the room."

"But I already know what I think. Can't I sleep here tonight?" He wriggled with energy, his whole body practically buzzed he was so happy.

"Certainly." The occupied business man answered with a flick of his wrist to open the phone. "Now stay right here until I get back, I don't want you wandering the halls like yesterday." Vlad turned from the room, and closed the door behind him, already going over the finalities of his newest acquisition. A few distracted minutes later found him settled behind his private study's desk, signing off on the last of the faxed over documents, preparing to send them back to Cynthia in New York. He pulled back the second to last page and was about to sign the last page when he noticed that it wasn't a document at all. Vlad had somehow dragged the clone's picture back into his study with him, and it was staring back up at him innocuously.

"Mr. Masters?" a disembodied voice asked from the other end of the cell.

"Oh? Yes, I've finished signing the last of the documents, and I'm faxing them now. Yes this did go a lot smoother than I thought it would. I'm glad they agreed so readily, to the updated conditions, as well. I'll talk to you when you get back to Wisconsin Cynthia, have a great flight." Vlad clicked the cell shut and stared down at the clone's gift. He had contemplated pinning it on the fridge, but it didn't seem right to put it up there. He wanted it somewhere they'd both see it regularly, and he rarely frequented the kitchen, and he doubted the clone would either. On the other hand, his study desk got plenty of use, and both him and the clone would be in here often enough to assuage any guilt about leaving it somewhere supposedly private. A small smile graced his lips as the picture balanced against a square shaped paper weight on the desk. He'd get it a real frame in a day or two. Once again, the squiggly unique, _personal_, touch on the bottom corner stuck out to him. It was significantly different seeing the clone mark something as his-_its_ own. If it was difficult thinking of it only neutrally or as a scientific curiosity before, those three little symbols made it basically impossible. _But maybe that's not such a bad thing. I can't thinking of D27 as an 'it' forever if I want to call…him my son one day. Maybe saying 'he' won't cause as many problems as I think._ Vlad pondered leaning back in his leather chair. The clone was still small and unstable, but he couldn't pretend it was just a ball of ectoplasm anymore. _If only it-__**he**__ didn't have such an endearing personality._ Vlad pondered before concluding, _but then if he wasn't so endearing, I wouldn't want to call D27 a 'he' right now, and I suppose that's a small 'sacrifice' to make for finding a way to start thinking of him as Daniel._

* * *

><p><strong>Balshumet:<strong>** Aww look, Vlad is getting attached to him! I think...he really is never clear on that when we talk about it, what with his constant denial and all. Plus, I promise the next chapter will be filled with adorable clone antics to make up for the awful melting here. I've already started on the 4th chapter, and I've up'd my updating schedule for this to make up for how behind I am. This week should be the 5th chapter and not the third, but I will be updating until I'm back on schedule. Probably by the end of this month.  
><strong>

**Now to talk about my other story Bittersweet, which has gone three weeks this weekend without update. I'm sorry my cross readers, I shall make it up to you. I'm currently writing this at 1am EST, and will post it right after 3am EST.(Which marks 12am on the Servers in the Pacific) It seems what I want to happen takes many more words than I thought. The result is, I'm going to have to cut this coming chapter in half, so that it's not over 20k words or something. It also means I had to re-work my where I want my chapters to end, so it took some re-planning. The bright side is, you should have a chapter later this night. The even more plus side is, you get another chapter where I didn't think there was going to be one, and so even more story has popped up to fill it in, so yay for more chapters!**** Anyway, that's all I have to say for now. Take care my readers, and as always my lovelies, R&R.**_  
><em>


	4. His Name is Daniel

**Balshumet: Hey you guys! I'm not dead! I promise. Yeah I know it has been a frightfully long time, and some of you might have given up, because it has been like over a year since I posted anything in this fandom, but I'm not dead. That's the good news.  
><strong>

**The great news is, my writing muse is back! I thought she had died and left me cold and alone like an abandoned kitten or something, but no, she lives. Unfortunately, she's as finnicky as always, but I am determined to bring her to heel, and so during the insanity that is NaNo, I shall be updating** **_both_ my Danny Phantom fanfics. Yes this one _and_ Bittersweet, even if it kills me. Well hopefully not literally, or this will never get done, but you know what I mean.****  
><strong>

**So I hope you enjoy this new installment, and after the Disclaimer, I'll see you at the bottom.  
><strong>

**Disclaimer: Alas! Even after a year and much muse fits, I still do not own Danny Phantom. This universe belongs to Hartman, Nick, Viacom, and a whole bunch of people who aren't me.  
><strong>

* * *

><p><strong>His Name is Daniel<strong>

Vlad finished up the last of his business calls and glanced at the clock on his study desk. _Barely after 8am, and it already feels like it's time for bed._ He stretched in muted fatigue before standing from behind the furniture piece and heading for the door. He'd promised to only be a few minutes, and more importantly after the melting scare a couple hours back, he didn't want to leave the clone alone for too long. So even though he could find more work to do, the CEO of Dalvco headed back towards the colorfully decorated room the clone was likely still bouncing off the walls in. He passed a few painting on the way, and it reminded him of the amazing improvements the young child had made in barely a three day period. It gave him a few ideas. _If I can expose him to some more of the arts, I wonder if he'd pick up on them as easily and quickly as he has drawing? _He mused while walking back to the clone's room. It was only a few doors down from his own set of rooms, for ease of access. He paused in front of his bedroom door, thinking about a collection of books and music he could test his theories about the clone with. Vlad frowned thoughtfully before plunging into the bedroom after the needed items.

_This is great! Everything is so bright and soft, and it's so quiet I can hear…what is that?_ D27 thought while wandering over to the set of bay windows overlooking the western side of the mansion.

Outside was a large Elm tree. Its strong interwoven branches were bursting with the golden wreaths of dying leaves. On the branches closest to the balcony, in a small blue jays' nest still intact from the summer nesting season, was a chubby bird calling into the mild fall air.

D27 gasped as he caught sight of the lapis creature set against the bright yellow background of the elm leaves. He backed away slowly, not wanting to spook the bird when it was making such an inviting picture. The remainder of his sketch supplies were just on the table in the middle of the room, and the image the bird was presenting was too good to miss. He tip-toed back to the window, determined to memorize every detail so that he could re-make it on the paper in his hands. He pressed himself as close to the glass as he would dare, breath frosting the cooler windows as he absorbed every detail of the scene with his mind's eye. There was no way the bird wouldn't fly off before he could draw it, so it was best to memorize now.

Vlad leaned against the door frame of the room, amused beyond reason at the clone's antics. Between his exaggerated attempts at stealth, and his childish wonder, silently watching D27 reminded him of all the reasons he'd wanted children in the first place. He wavered between interrupting the clone, he did want to test a few theories, and just watching him work, it was rather entertaining after all. In the end, his greater curiosity about the learning ability of the clone won over the entertainment value of watching him sneak around the room. "D27?" the older man called.

He turned away from the chirping creature just outside the window when he heard his Daddy call. D27 smiled over from his position at the window before glancing back towards the bird's nest. "Shush Daddy, you'll scare it." He replied from his perch by the balcony doors.

"Oh?" Vlad asked while crossing the room to stand next to the engrossed child. The blue jay called louder through the window; drawing his attention. He couldn't stop the small smile working its way across his face at the sight of the bird's nest. He glanced down at the boy practically pressing his face against the glass in excitement. A warm tingle Vlad recognized as affection spread through his chest. Just then, an idea hit him and the older halfa reached forward and turned the handle for the balcony windows. "Come on. Why don't we get a closer look?" He offered while stepping onto the balcony proper.

"Buh, Daddy, it'll fly away." D27 grabbed onto the cuff of his jacket and tugged gently, not wanting frighten the bird.

"Oh no he won't, this bird is very friendly." Vlad replied, walking closer to the edge of the balcony. He remembered the animal living in the nest very well. It was practically hand feed by his staff, all of them thinking it was adorable since it was a chick. The result was, the blue jay was very people friendly, so he was sure it wouldn't so much as budge. _Well it would if we offered it food._ He sauntered up to the edge, right next to the molded white railing and guided the clone out from behind him. Just as he supposed, the bird hadn't done much but chirp and look in their direction, too convinced another large feeding was on the way.

Eyes wide and breath short, D27 stood on the tips of his toes, just a few feet from the little blue bird he'd been watching from the other side of the window. He felt a wide smile split his face from ear to ear, growing more excited every second the bird didn't fly away. Suddenly, he remembered the sketch pad in his hands, and the reason for walking this close flashed into the front of his mind. Gingerly, he retreated from his spot right next to the railing, just far enough away to be able to use his black sketch maker. After getting the paper into the proper position, he tiptoed back to the railing, placing his paper on top of it for stability. D27 held his breath as started the first strokes for the rough drawing of the bird. As he leaned against the railing, he didn't notice his hands phasing out of tangibility…

Leaning against the railing a few feet from the clone, Vlad was enjoying the fast warming autumn air. While he had wanted to see how fast the clone could absorb entirely new types of information, just watching him draw was suddenly more appealing. He passed D27 a side-long glance when he felt a small amount of ghost energy coming from his direction. The clone's core still turned on at seemingly random times, so sensing even a small amount of energy was always surprising. The elder hybrid caught the sight of his hands disappearing through the railing at the last moment. "D27!" He cried. Vlad watched as the clone looked towards him, startled by his call just before his hands slipped through the rails and he flipped over the edge of the balcony.

Vlad only had a few tenths of a second to respond and catch him before he slammed into ground below. His reaction was instantaneous. Transforming, and teleporting only a wire thin moment afterwards, he reappeared just inches under D27, with just a split second to grasp him before crashing into the deck below himself.

The majority of the energy had been absorbed by Vlad's body or turned into sound. The hardwood floor of the deck dented and cracked slightly with the impact, depressing a few inches lower, the wood otherwise intact.

He wasn't sure what had happened. One minute he'd been standing on the edge of the balcony sketching the pretty blue bird and the next, he was looking up at the sky, strong arms holding him tightly. D27 heard a sigh from behind him, and he wriggled around to see who was holding him. "Daddy?"

That had been too close for comfort. While a fall from this height wouldn't have killed the clone, he would have definitely been hurt. That would have pushed his core to make more energy to replace the amount being used to heal him, and _that_ would have likely resulted in another melting episode, and Vlad had dealt with enough of those for one day. Never mind the thought that D27 could get hurt was sending tendrils of terror streaking through his core, he wasn't ready to confront his growing affection as of yet. Vlad shifted the clone away from his chest when he heard him say his name. "D27, are you alright?"

"I think so." He responded head swiveling around to take in his new surroundings. "What happen?"

"What _happened_ is you fell off of the balcony." Vlad explained while standing from the dent in his deck. "Your hands turned intangible, and you flipped right over the edge. Luckily, I caught you, and are you sure you're fine?" He held the D27 out at arm length giving him a once over. _He doesn't even appear to be bruised…which is more than what I can say for my back._

"I'm sure Daddy." D27 answered while attempting to wiggle his way back to the ground below. He smiled and bounced off a few feet when his feet touched the decks' surface, trying to get a good look at where he had fallen. He leaned back, just getting sight of the railing where the balcony was when he heard his Daddy groan. "Are _you_ ok?" He piped up worriedly, watching his Daddy rubbing circles along the lower part of his back.

"Just fine D27," Vlad started suppressing another groan, "but maybe we should go back inside?" _Where there are chairs I can rest my sore back in for one…_He transformed back into human form before stalking over to the foyer doors leading to the deck. The billionaire passed an expectant glance over his shoulder as he crossed the threshold, beckoning the young clone back inside.

With only a small look spared for the colorful inviting view outside, D27 rushed back inside after his Daddy. He felt a little squiggle of butterflies in his tummy. He hadn't been to this part of the house before; in fact he rarely left the upstairs section or the lab, other than that one time he'd wandered off. Little D walked up to his Daddy and reached up and grasped his larger hand. "Where are we?" he asked eyes darting to and fro; taking in the new décor of every space.

"The western part of the mansion. I don't think you've been down here before…" _and now that I think about it, the nearest drawing room with comfortable chairs is way too far away for my taste._ Vlad realized as a tug drew him to a stop. "What is it?" _And can't it wait until after we find a chair?_

"What's in there?" He carefully pointed to the only room they'd passed so far that was closed. It wasn't an uncommon sight, most of the rooms upstairs had closed doors if he remembered correctly, but since they hadn't passed any closed doors before, this one had piqued his interest.

"Oh? I believe that's my video-audio repository; it's where- hold on a moment!"

Too excited to really wait for an answer, _what's a video-audio repository anyway? ,_ D27 rushed over to the door and turned the handle. He was rewarded with a soft squeak as the well oiled hinges of the door worked to open it. He nearly raced inside; he didn't get to explore much of anything often, and stopped dead in the center of the room. On one wall facing directly ahead was an enormous bookcase, or it seemed similar to one in his opinion. Instead of books, like there were in his Daddy's study, it was covered in a combination of thick and slim black rectangles. It also was much larger than any bookcase he'd ever seen, reaching from ceiling, way taller than even his Daddy, to the floor. Intrigued, D27 stalked forward to peer at the items sitting on the shelf. He reached forward and grabbed one of the shiny black things on the bookcase. "What's it?"

"Articulate," Vlad noted with a slight roll of his eyes. "_That_ is a case for a DVDs, CDs, VHS tapes and the like."

"Yeah, but _what's_ it?" D27 repeated. _I know what a bookshelf is Daddy…_Sometimes his Daddy acted like he was still a baby.

"I-Oh, they hold recordings, you do know what recordings are right," Vlad paused until after the clone nodded, "of music and movies, pictures and sound. You know it would be much easier to explain things to you if you were more specific." He gazed down at the very inattentive looking boy rummaging through the cases in front of him.

"So if they have moosac and stuff inside them, how do you get it out?" He picked up a slim black container and shook it up and down, hoping it would do something.

"_Music_, D27, and you have to place the item inside something that can read the disk." The older halfa reached down and plucked the case from the clone's hands. He opened the CD case with a click and placed the shiny golden disk into the boy's hand. "Now this is a recording of music, Vivaldi to be precise. You can play CDs in a multitude of devices, but in this case, if you'd like to listen to it, you can put it inside the multimedia player over there." Vlad turned and pointed to a series of speakers to the left of the large shelf. "Now there's more th-wait a second!" Before he could even finish his sentence, the easily excitable child had rushed across the room, CD in hand. _Oh why did I even bother asking him to slow down?_ He caught up with the rambunctious clone just as he was trying to shove the CD unceremoniously into the player in the wrong slot. "Stop that." He commanded in a moderately stern tone. The last thing he needed the boy to do was break an expensive piece of equipment.

D27 did as he was asked before turning to look up in his Daddy's direction. "I thought you said it went in the player thingy." He really wanted to hear some music, _whatever that is_, and the player wouldn't work.

"It does," Vlad held up his hand before the boy could make more protests, "but just not in that section. It plays more than one type of disk, and _you_ are currently trying to shove it in the section for DVDs, which is why it keeps spitting it back out. Now," he quickly grabbed the CD out of the younger halfa's hand before he could get anymore half-formed ideas, "this goes in here, and then it'll play the first recorded song."

The CD disappeared into the proper slot and came to life only moments after it was placed inside. The first singing notes of _Spring_ filled the room as the violin strings played through the opening stanzas.

It had to be the prettiest thing he'd ever heard in his entire life. _Prettier than the sunset last night looked, prettier than the sound of the bird I was going to sketch a little bit ago, prettier than…than…um anything __**ever**__._He concluded after the first phrase repeated itself softer than the start of the song. "That's bootiful!" D27 muttered in an awe filled voice.

"Beautiful," Vlad corrected gently before starting to hum along, "and yes I agree. However," Vlad watched as D27's playful attempts at dancing on beat paused as the CD changed songs, "there are more than just CDs here. In fact, I think you'd enjoy movies much more."

"What's a movie?" D27 asked face scrunched up in confusion.

Vlad smiled as he guided the younger halfa to another shelf of media. "I think it would be much easier to show you." He leaned over to the boy's level before saying, "why don't you pick one out?"

"But there are so many!" D27's wide eyes swept over the section of the case with the movies in indecision. He wanted his first movie to be a good one.

"Just pick one from the children's section and come along. We aren't even supposed to be doing this; I wanted to go over some things with you before lunch." Vlad glanced down at his watch, noting that it was nearly 10am. _We've wasted over an hour between this and the balcony antics earlier. If we don't hurry, I'll end up having to take some business calls._

D27 stuck out his tongue as he pondered over his selection. He couldn't tell what they were about just by reading the titles, but he didn't have time to read the backs! With another moment spared for wavering between two titles, he scoped up the case with the picture of a dog and cat on the front and rushed for the door.

"Well hold on a minute; we don't have to go that quickly." The older halfa protested after the clone made for the exit at lightning speed. _And now I know why parents have small children on leashes in public._ He thought with wry amusement.

A few minutes and much chasing later, the two of them were back to Little D's new bedroom; Vlad vowing to invent a halfa proof leash or some other kind of restraint, _running through walls indeed,_ and D27 continuing to excitedly bounce around the still novel area.

"Alright! _Sugar cookies_ child; would you please sit still for just a moment?"

He immediately stopped bouncing on the bed and flopped to the floor in front of it, the picture of serious attentiveness. His sudden demeanor change from hyperactive to the hallmark of staid almost inspired laughter from his father.

_Well if I had known it was that easy…_Vlad shook his head and finally took a look at the video the clone had chosen. "Ah Disney, an excellent choice." _Or so everyone under 12 who visits seems to think._ He couldn't suppress the warm smile working its way across his face at the boy's delighted grin and added effort at sitting still. He looked over the case once more and found that other than the prominent Disney label, there was nothing remotely familiar about the contents. _Though I suppose that's not too surprising._ He concluded after a moment before looking back up at D27.

His formerly controlled wiggles were becoming full-fledged bounces once again. _Come on Daddy…I want to watch the movie…_

The older halfa decided to spare the child any more waiting. "Now I'm going to put this in, so you might want to sit over there…" Vlad trailed off as Little D shot up like a rocket from his spot in front of the bed in favor the one he suggested closer to the television coming from behind a panel in the wall. "Yes well," he quickly recovered, "just watch the screen." Without further ado, he placed the DVD into the player and walked over to a nice spot behind D27 where he could watch both the movie and the clone in peace.

All of the little boy's impatient movement ceased as soon as the screen came to life. He'd never seen light and sound like the stuff flowing across the television, and between the colorful moving pictures and the delightful music he was totally hooked.

The opening credits had an entirely different effect on the person standing behind D27. From the first cloying notes of the movie, Vlad suddenly recalled why he _hated_ Disney movies. _Terrible music set to childish cartoons._ He rolled his eyes as the "unfortunate" main character cat was rained on in his abandoned box to the point of being washed away. Just then, he felt his cell phone vibrate. _Cynthia…suppose she would be in by now."_ He pressed his lips into a hard line in indecision before glancing over at the room's other occupant. _Utterly engrossed._ He concluded after only a moment. _ I'm sure he won't miss me one bit._ Vlad justified already half-way to the door.

He really couldn't believe it. This was way better than CDs. _Daddy was right. Of course his is, because he knows everything._ The orange cat on the screen, Oliver he remembered, ran into a white dog that _sang. Best thing ever. _He thought as the song concluded and the colorful assortment of moving pictures changed to a building by the water.

* * *

><p>D27 jumped up excitedly from the floor when the movie ended. He just had to watch it again. He stood in front of the television for a few moments before realizing he had no idea how to work it. The little clone felt a frown come across his face as he pondered the puzzle of getting the movie to play again before turning around to just ask Daddy to do it for him. <em>He's probably just waiting for me to ask anyway.<em> D27 blinked as he took in the empty room.

He hadn't been expecting that. Sure his Daddy was busy, but he had promised to…_Well not exactly. He promised to be right back, and he was. He never said he would stay._ All the same, sometimes he wished _he_ was the most important thing on his Daddy's busy list of things to do. D27 frowned as he took one last look at the empty room before coming to a decision. He'd just go find his Daddy and ask him how to fix the movie thing himself. With his plan of attack in mind, he stomped away from his new bedroom determined to find his father and make him pay attention long enough to answer his question. From his experience, holding his attention was a challenge in and of itself.

Half way to where he was sure his Daddy's study had to be, he'd searched three different directions already, he spotted something interesting. D27 had passed by more than one open door on the way to his destination, and he'd seen rooms like this before, honestly they all looked the same to him, but this time what it held was actually more intriguing than his personal mission to track down his father. _Is that, the um, music making thing from the movie?_ D27 walked into the room staring at the large black object on the far wall. He skipped up to the bench in front of it and peered over the top at the keys. After a few moments of inspection, a large grin split his face from ear to ear. He started to clamber to the top of the bench when he suddenly stopped and nervously glanced back at the open door. _Well, I know I'm not supposed to touch stuff without asking, but it won't hurt it just to play with it a little. _He banished the worries of getting in trouble from his mind, and finished climbing to the top of the bench.

D27 took a moment to steady himself on the large cool bench, before reaching out as far as he could and resting his hands on the white and black keys. He gingerly pressed down on a white key, only to jump back with a sound came from the instrument in front of him. Now even more excited, he began trying random keys all over the place wherever he could reach. He giggled when he hit two keys that created some dissonance. "This is so fun! Hm, I wonder if I…"

"So you're telling me, that once you actually got into the nuts and bolts of the acquisition they completely made an about face? Just what did they _think_ we were agreeing to? Being best friends forever?" Vlad paused as Cynthia on the other side responded. "Well I hope you told them we'd be going through with the buy out whether their board liked it or not. We already have a controlling interest in the company, this was just a formality. Mmm, yes! Of course I know this won't be the best for the new, less overtly aggressive, image we were trying to cultivate, but I don't care! I've played nice with Axiom as long as I care to, now do-Jumping Juniper Berry Muffins! - Oh not you Cynthia, it's just, could I call you back? I need to take care of something," Vlad said while standing up stiffly from his chair behind his study desk. Another loud cacophonous clang came from somewhere in the house, as he pushed in the chair and walked briskly towards the door. "What? No, I promise I'll call _you_, it should only take a minute or two, but it needs my full attention. Thanks." He frowned as the sounds only picked up in regularity.

Shutting the door behind him, Vlad stalked out of his study and towards the increasingly loud and unbearably dissonant sounds. His mouth quirked into a thin line as he stood, finally, in front of the room where the noise was originating. The clamor was nearly deafening to his sensitive ghost hearing, and he had one guess who was the cause of it. "D27," Vlad said before he'd even set foot inside the room, "stop that this instant!"

D27 gasped from his spot on the bench in front of the piano. "Daddy?" He'd been having so much fun; he'd forgotten all about finding him in the first place.

"That piano is rather expensive, and you banging on it like that is going to throw it out of tune." He responded, an angry glower having settled upon his features. He watched as the clone shrunk on the bench in front of the grand piano, the boy's face a mixture of sadness and frustration. Just as quickly as his anger had come, it left. It wasn't the clone's fault he got easily distracted and wandered off, nor that he didn't know how to actually treat an expensive piece like that Steinway B. With a sigh, he released the last of his anger and asked, "What were you trying to play?"

"Um…" He hadn't been trying to play anything! Well nothing specific anyway, he'd just been hitting keys. He fidgeted under his Daddy's expectant gaze before shrugging his shoulders.

"Well, would you like to _learn_ how to play something?" Vlad offered with a small smile on his face. He slipped besides the antsy clone and breezily settled his hands onto the keys. It had been a while since he'd played anything, but rusty or not, he was still good enough to give the boy a quick lesson. _And finally test that theory about how fast he learns…_

"I'd lo-oh you know how to play Daddy?" D27 switched words mid-sentence, from accepting the offer to asking a question.

"I do. I learned when I was a child, as many children do, and played for several years before I left for college." Vlad experimentally played a few chords, warming up his hands. "I stopped playing after that though, after I got fully settled into my major of choice, there wasn't much time for more artistic pursuits. Though, I suppose I didn't _make _time for it." By the time he'd finished his little spiel he had the clone's full attention.

"Good. Now, I really should give you an explanation of the notes and their names, along with keys and scales." Vlad rolled his eyes as the young boy sitting next to him made a face. "We could do without, but then you could run the risk of making more noise than music, like that banging from before."

"You didn't like my music?" D27 managed a doe eyed pout before switching to a particularly grumpy frown. He had liked it after all.

"Ah, no, what I meant was, wouldn't you like to learn to play one of the songs you've heard before instead of making something up?"

D27 thought it over, before nodding once and sending a calm attentive look in his Daddy's direction.

"How about something simple then? _Row, row, row your boat_ is easy enough, and it'll allow me to explain some very basic concepts. Take this key for example, "Vlad paused to gesture to a white key near the very center of the piano. "This note is called "middle 'c' ". It's near the middle of most keyboards and all pianos, as the name would suggest. To the right of it is the note 'd' and next to that 'e'. The octave, from one 'c' to another in this case, though necessarily eight notes by design, is 'c', 'd', 'e', 'f', 'g', 'a', 'b', 'c'." Vlad looked down at an increasingly squirming D27. _So impatient. I hope he grows out of that, if not I'll have to get rid of that trait myself._ Vlad mentally grumbled before continuing with the lesson. "Now that that basic lesson is through, I can teach you to pay a simple tune."

"What are the black keys for?"

"Oh well, we'll get to those later-"

"But I wanna know now!"

"Alright, don't start whining. So, those keys are called accidentals. They are half steps, half-tones, between the parts of the piano, the notes, a full tone apart." _Well that's not exactly right, but close enough._ "If you notice, between 'e' and 'f' and 'b' and 'c' there are no black keys. That's because they are already only a half-tone apart. Now, that is all we are going to talk about those keys for the moment." When D27 looked ready to protest, Vlad interrupted, "wouldn't you rather learn to _play_ something instead? In fact, right before this you were complaining about learning anything at all, other than a song that is."

At the prospect of actually learning a song, the young clone decided against saying anything else. _Well, I guess I can always ask more questions later._ He rationalized.

When he was sure D27 wouldn't say more, the older halfa guided the boy's right hand and placed it over his own. "So I'm going to play the first part of the song and say the notes' names as I go along. Pay attention, because I don't want you to learn just from the muscle memory alone, and it'll help your sight reading in the future to know the names of the notes."

A few minutes later, the clone had mastered a hand full of beginner songs. He had begun to work in his left hand, when they had predictably run into a problem. The boy was having trouble using both hands at once, since it required moving them at different times.

"This is impossible!" D27 slid his hands from the keys and pouted. He hadn't expected it to be so hard. _It's even harder than trying to turn into a ghost…_ At least then he was sure he was doing the right thing; _now_ he was sure it was all wrong. He turned to look up at his impromptu teacher, sure that he'd be sporting a look of disapproval similar to the one from yesterday.

In fact, Vlad was only entertained by the boy's melodramatics. "Is it? Well how about we test that theory?" He asked with a slowly growing smile. He easily combined with the melody with the simple chords played by his left hand, and sent a look in D27's direction. "You know, very little worth doing is easy to do. I know most things come quickly and with little effort for you, but I can promise that the best things in your life will take effort to achieve." He moved his hands from the keys and gestured to his student. "Why don't you try again?" Vlad watched as the clone reluctantly set his little fingers back to the task of playing, a look of pure focus on his face.

D27's nose scrunched up every timed he hit a wrong note, or missed the proper timing, but he continued to try. After a couple more minutes the song was nearly flawless. "I think I almost get it."

"Indeed." His teacher responded with a nod of encouragement.

"Hey Daddy?" the younger halfa stopped playing the song and looked back up at Vlad. "How many songs do you know?"

"Quite a few, off hand, I'd estimate-"

"Do you know this one?" D27 interrupted to hum the starting stanzas to one of the songs he'd heard in the movie. It was his favorite, and even better, it was played on the piano.

"I don't believe I've ever heard that one." _It sounds like some ghastly pop monstrosity. Where in the world would he have-"_

"It was in the movie I picked. I was hoping…" D27 trailed off, getting discouraged by the look on his Daddy's face.

"Well…" Vlad stopped his objections cold after seeing the child's crestfallen facial expression. "I might not know it yet, but like you I'm a fast learner. Why don't you sing it for me, and I'll play the melody? You remember what the 'melody' is right?" _It can't be too difficult, and if it would make the boy stop that Danish-filled pouting…_

"Yes!" D27 replied with enthusiasm snapping back into his voice and demeanor.

_You and me together we'll be  
>Forever you'll see<br>We two can be good company  
>You and me<br>Yes, together we two  
>Together, that's you<br>Forever with me  
>We'll always be good company<br>You and me…_

Vlad picked up the melody with ease and a few seconds after that began to improvise the left hand.

"No! That's not right, it goes like this." The clone interrupted and started humming the rest of the song.

"Ah, my mistake." He chuckled and changed his left hand to the new set of repeating notes the clone was humming. D27's face lit up, now much more satisfied with how it sounded.

"That's almost perfect, um, but I think I did the melody wrong though."

"That's quite alright. This is more than enough to work with." Vlad stated with a sly smile.

"Work with?" the confused child asked.

"Yes, listen." After finishing the last refrain, he began to add notes to the melody, creating a twirling counter melody to the piece. At the same time he intensified the complexity of the chords and the depth. Before long, the room was ringing with a more symphonic version of the song. Without evening meaning to, Vlad got drawn into the music and the art of improved composition.

D27 happily sung along with what he still recognized of the melody until he lost track and got swept away into the music. Finally, his Daddy began to re-simplify the music until it was back to the original tones of the song.

_You and me together we'll be, forever you'll see, we'll always be good company _the clone started again._ You and me , _Vlad joined,_ just wait and see _they finished together with the last twinkling notes of the song.

"Play it again!" D27 insisted with an eager grin.

"I-" before he could finish responding, the clock in the hall chimed out the hour. "Good heavens, how did it get so late?" He wondered worriedly. He was supposed to call Cynthia back over an hour ago. _Well there goes the claim of calling my secretary 'right back'._ Vlad sighed and stood from in front of the Steinway. "I'm afraid we've wasted enough time here. At this point it would be better to wait until after lunch to call my office back, but until then, there's something I wanted to show you." _If we can __**ever**__ get around to it._

"But, I wanted to learn more music…" the young child grumbled while sending a dissatisfied frown in his father's direction.

"Some other time D27, as at the moment, we have something better to do."

"But-"

"_No_ 'buts'. The piano will be here later, and there are several more in the house other than this one. We can continue this at another time."

D27 slid from the bench in front of the piano, and rushed over to his Daddy to tug at the hem of his shirt. "_Daddy-"_

"Blast it D27-"

"Please…" he practically begged with extra large eyes.

"Listen, I promised we'll play more after lunch, but now-"

"Cross your heart, super promise right?"

Vlad let out a frustrated sigh. _And sometimes I wish he was still too small to talk. At least then he didn't complain and whine, even __**if**__ I had to change diapers._ "Cross my heart," he said with an 'x' gesture over his chest. "We _will_ play more later; I'll even find you a real instructor. Now," the elder halfa started while picking up and placing the clone onto his hip so he couldn't either drag his feet or run away. "We're going back to your room. I have some books I want you to read before it gets any later in the day."

"Ok, but Daddy?" D27 wiggled so he could look back up at his father.

The weary businessman resisted the urge to snap at the small child. "Yes?" _So many fudging questions…_

"If you aren't going to teach me, could I learn something else?"

"Something else…could you clarify?"

"Yeah, like a different music maker." The piano was very pretty, at least when his Daddy played it, but he just didn't feel like he was going to get it. Maybe there was another type of music thing he could play better.

"Instrument you mean," Vlad absently corrected. He turned over the idea in his head a moment before responding, "I don't see why not, but I didn't think you were interested in anything else." _Not to mention you haven't seen or heard any other type of instrument._

"I wanna learn to play the spring."

"What?" Even though the clone was highly developed in some respects, he was still reminded of his lack of real life experience at seemingly random times. "D27, spring isn't an instrument it's a season." Vlad stopped in front of the boy's new bedroom and shifted the ever wiggling child into a more comfortable position.

"But you said that it was!" _Honestly, sometimes I think Daddy just likes to confuse me._ He mentally griped. "That's what you said made the music on the shiny circle."

"D27 that was the name of the _song. _It was played on string instruments, the violin actually."

"Oh…well I want to play that." He wiggled, finally, out of his Daddy's hold and promptly ran over to the bed. He remembered how bouncy they were.

"I'm sure that can be arranged. Now stop bouncing on the mattress," _before I need to replace it,_ "and come over here." Vlad chided, trying to decide between going over to stop him and organizing the variety of materials he'd grabbed from his personal library before their trip over the balcony railing.

He stopped jumping on the bed, using the final bounce to hop to the floor, before rushing over to the table, curious over its contents. "What's it?"

Vlad mentally rolled his eyes over the choice of phrase before responding. "_This_ is a volume of British poetry; though I'd rather you start with some American history. This particular book is about the revolutionary war against the British Empire. Here," Vlad said while handing him a book that was closer to a door-stop than light reading. "Start with this; we'll move on after you get some background done."

* * *

><p>It was more than an hour after lunch before he'd finally gotten back into contact with his secretary. She had worked through lunch and solidified the acquisition, much to the increasingly verbalized displeasure of the former board of directors. <em>Morons. As if they could actually do anything about it. I have a controlling interest in the company's stocks. If they had been paying <em>_**any**__ attention this would have never happened. Still I'm glad this is out of the way. Now I can focus more energy into my ghostly pursuits, and D27._ He stretched and stood from behind his desk in his study. He'd set the clone down for a nap after lunch, and despite the fact he'd like more peace and quiet after the hectic morning; he had a feeling the boy would be awake again soon. _Would it kill him to keep more normal sleeping hours?_

Vlad winced as soon as the thought had crossed his mind. The clone's abnormal sleep schedule was mostly his fault. He'd never even tried to get it on a schedule. The growth acceleration, the needed monitoring, and interventions made the idea initially seem like a waste of effort. Now though, he was wishing he'd at least attempted it, because was really _was_ ready for a nap after all the work and worry over the last day or so especially. _Well maybe they'll be some luck, and he'll still be asleep._ The older halfa severely doubted it, but positive thinking wouldn't hurt anything. Happy thoughts of peacefully napping clones in mind, the man started back to D27's bedroom from his study. He arrived to find the boy already awake, and reading a tome of a book on Middle Ages art. "You're awake?" Vlad noted blearily. _So much for those happy thoughts…_

D27 smiled up from his position in the middle of the room. "I told you I wasn't sleepy Daddy…" He looked back into the book sitting on his lap, and flipped the page.

"You did," his father started with a touch of confusion in his tone. _Children his age sleep much more than this, and with how fast he's growing; he should be exhausted. I'll have to look into it…_ He was nearly sure it was some minor quirk, but he wanted to be absolutely certain. At the moment though, it could wait. "What are you reading?" Vlad asked while taking a peek at the contents of the book.

"Learning about the changes in subject matter in Middle Age art as it turned into the Renaissance." He replied distracted by the pictures used as examples inside the book.

"Oh, and do you know _when_ the Middle Ages supposedly turned into the Renaissance?"

"Um, they haven't said yet, not a single date or anything, but I like the realism movement more than the impressionist movement that started after." He suddenly commented.

"I thought you were reading about the Middle Ages?" The older halfa questioned the seeming non-sequitur.

"Well, I am now, but I read about the impressionists and the formation of cubism before this. I think I'm going backwards." D27 set down his current book and pointed out two others. "I did like the mil-terry history of the United States though, but the Crusades and um 'Age of Colonialism' was more interesting because there were more places to read about."

His father raised an eyebrow at the number of books he had supposedly consumed. "You read all this in the last 3 hours?"

"It gets faster to read the longer I do it." the boy wiggled the art book in his lap into a more comfortable position, and continued reading.

Vlad was content to silently watch for several minutes as the scientist in him was fascinated by the clone's extraordinary pace. _His ordinary reading speed rivals mine when I'm speed reading. That's incredible considering yesterday he was toddling through children's chapter books. _The boy's results far exceeded his expectations, and if his retention was as high as the conversation suggested…_I might need to start actively planning his learning schedule to make sure he's being consistently challenged._ Vlad was just starting a preliminary outline of a learning plan when he once again sensed the clone's core activate.

This time was different, stronger. It was enough to snap him out of his thoughts and make him eye the boy cautiously. The last time it had activated, trip off the balcony notwithstanding, when he'd been around; the clone had tried to melt. "D27, are you feeling alright?"

"Yeah…" he answered absently, distracted by an especially beautiful fresco rendering in some place called "The Sistine Chapel."

"Are you sure?" Vlad asked again when he felt the energy coming from the boy increase sharply. He was about to tell the Maddie AI to bring up D27's vitals when the boy's energy hit a new high and less than a second later there was a flash of bright light. He froze in anticipation as familiar white rings began to travel the length of the younger halfa's body. The elder halfa held his breath as they made it to shoulder and knee level, but then petered out.

D27 blinked several times as the light finally cleared from his vision. He looked up, startled and watery eyed, at his Daddy. It hadn't hurt, but it had been very unexpected. Most of all, he'd felt different and he'd had no control over the change.

Vlad rushed over to the clone, having already called up the input from the Nanites. "Maddie, are you certain these readings are accurate?" He asked while holding an ever more upset D27.

"Affirmative lovekins, the clone is still fully stable. The outpouring of energy hasn't harmed him, and the readings indicate the build-up of more."

"Shush, D27, you're fine." The elder halfa soothed while paging through the floating windows of holographic data hovering in front of him. From what he could tell, the boy's core had just spontaneously triggered. In fact, it was similar to how his own had just suddenly fully turn on after a few months in the hospital, at least if he was reading the data correctly. And that was rather surprising, since not even a full day before the boy had been incapable of transforming, even while consciously working at it. He flipped back to the first screen and watched with apprehension as his spectral energy levels rose further. Finally, he concluded it was a normal, and more importantly safe, occurrence before eventually looking down at the calmer clone in his lap. "D27, how would you like to try to transform again?"

"I don't know…" he remembered how demanding and hard it had been. Specifically, he remembered his Daddy had said he wasn't able to do it yet. "You sure I can really do it this time?" He didn't want to tire himself out. The green eating stuff, that Daddy said wasn't actually eating him, came back when he did that. He definitely was sure he didn't want _that_ to ever happen again.

"Absolutely positive. How about this? I'll transform too, at the same time." Vlad offered as he watched the boy's energy begin to spike once more. He was sure it wouldn't obscure his readings, since he'd long ago calibrated the majority of his instruments to filter out his spectral signature.

"Um…" he thought about it for a few seconds as a weird feeling he hadn't noticed before started up inside him.

"It'll be fine I promise. Now, you remember how to transform?"

"Yes Daddy." D27 responded, unsure now that the feeling had gotten impossible to ignore. It was like something cold pushing inside him.

"Ok, so I want you to give it a try on the count of three." The older halfa eyed the screen as the energies reached the levels it had the last time he'd almost spontaneously transformed. "One…two…three!" Vlad counted off, and hoped he was right about the spike being harmless.

D27 closed his eyes and reached for the cool part inside him once more. This time, it was much easier, and all of a sudden there was a rush of cool energy all over. It felt like it lasted forever, but like it ended all too soon. He opened his eyes, just as the flashes of black and white light were fading. _Something's wrong!_ The young child thought with gradually growing panic. Everything felt different and weird, and just plain _new_. "Daddy…" he called tentatively.

Vlad for his part had been joyously taking in the clone's ghost form. It was a perfect match for Daniel, except for being much younger.

When his Daddy didn't respond, D27 really started to get distressed. Before he knew it, panicky tears were spilling down his cheeks.

"D27, it's ok!" Vlad gasped when he caught the scared look on the boy's face. "You're fine; you did it!" He stood up with the clone in his arms and spun them both once. "You transformed D27; you did it!" He repeated with an ever-growing grin on his face. His own excitement seemed to calm the boy down, and after another happy spin, the young child began to smile. Then he laughed, and before Vlad knew it, so was he. He wasn't just happy because of what it meant for his own accomplishments; he was overjoyed almost for the sake of being so. It was like he could _feel_ D27's own exhilaration as well.

"I really did it Daddy?" D27 questioned with another giggle.

"See for yourself…" Vlad responded while floating over to the mirror on the dresser. He watched with warm affection as the boy took in his new appearance with growing pride. Suddenly, Skulker's words came back to him. _D27 really is an awful name_. "So my boy, I was thinking…" Vlad waited until he had the c- _my son's- _excited, but full attention. "D27 is a rather unusual name, and I was thinking you'd perhaps like another." When the boy didn't respond, Vlad continued, "how's Daniel sound?"

D27 blinked a few times as he thought it over, and then smiled and nodded.

"Well then, Daniel it is."

* * *

><p><strong>Balshumet: So, that's the chapter, I hope you enjoyed it, because it was a true labor of love. Nothing serious going on in my life, other than the yearly insanity that is National Novel Writing Month. If you haven't done it, you should because it's a fun, exhilarating, and terrifying time. It's one every writer should have at least once in their lives. As for Bittersweet, look for it over the next week. I shall keep my word, because if I don't do it now, my muse will try to go on strike again, and that's just unacceptable. <strong>

**Before I go, I also would like to Disclaim those lovely Lyrics from _Oliver and Company_ as written by Manilow and enjoyed by millions. Keep an eye on the song, it's going to make a few appearances, and well, it's cute now, but don't assume it'll always be so sweet.  
><strong>

**I'll see you on the other side of a Bittersweet chapter, and as always my lovelies R&R. **


End file.
